Vascular ultrasound for cardiovascular risk stratification in asymptomatic patients with type-2 diabetes

To identify new independent vascular markers to predict cardiovascular events in patients with type-2 diabetes (T2D), and their incremental value compared to the Swedish National Diabetes Register (NDR) risk score.

A retrospective cohort study was conducted on 1332 asymptomatic patients with T2D, free from prior CV event, assessed for a cardiovascular work-up, including Duplex ultrasonography to detect plaque on carotid and femoral arteries. The extent of atherosclerosis was rated as atherosclerosis burden score (ABS). Patients were followed up to 5 years and the occurrence of cardiovascular events recorded.

A total of 82 patients (6.2%) experienced a cardiovascular event, including 34 (2.6%) myocardial infarction, 18 (1.4%) cardiac revascularisation and 17 (1.3%) stroke. The independent determinants of these events were male sex (HR = 1.81 [1.13-2.88], p = 0.013) and ABS ≥ 2 (HR = 1.98 [1.21-3.25], p = 0.007). The NDR risk score performed poorly to predict cardiovascular events (area under the curve = 0.56 [0.49-0.63], p = 0.11), whereas screening for atherosclerotic plaques provided significant incremental prognostic value over the NDR score (model χ2 increase: +231%, p = 0.002).

Duplex ultrasonography to screen for atherosclerotic plaques improve the estimation of cardiovascular prognosis on top of clinical data and could be routinely used to improve cardiovascular risk stratification.