The effectiveness of the LA-FINDRISC screening tool in identifying cardiometabolic risk in young female patients with...

Background: breast cancer patients present a high prevalence of other chronic diseases and metabolic alterations, including overweight at diagnosis of cancer. This risk also increases after oncology treatment and is a current concern for Latin American countries. Currently, the use of different criteria to identify cardiometabolic risk has been widely applied, considering anthropometric, biochemical and clinical parameters. Additionally, the development of validated screening tools, such as the FINDRISC and LA-FINDRISC, has been considered useful for clinicians to assess metabolic risk in different populations. Objective: the present study aims to evaluate the effectiveness of the FINDRISC and LA-FINDRISC questionnaires to identify cardiometabolic risk in young women with breast cancer. Material and methods: a total of 52 participants were included. Results: a sensitivity of 83 % and specificity of 89 % were found for FINDRISC, and a sensitivity of 91 % and specificity of 74 % for LA-FINDRISC to detect alterations in glucose metabolism. Conclusions: both questionnaires showed lower sensitivity than the international standard criteria for metabolic syndrome, which consider biochemical parameters to assess metabolic alterations. However, these tools and anthropometric measures are useful and easy to apply for clinicians to identify, prevent and treat potential comorbidities associated to cardiometabolic risk in young women with breast cancer.