PURPOSE: Coronary artery disease (CAD) shares several risk factors with abdominal aortic aneurysm (AAA). We evaluated the prevalence during transthoracic echocardiography (TTE) and risk factors of AAA in patients with CAD. MATERIALS AND METHODS: A total of 1300 CAD patients were screened from August 2009 to May 2010, and measurement of abdominal aorta size was feasible in 920 patients (71%) at the end of routine TTE. An AAA was defined as having a maximal diameter of > or =30 mm. RESULTS: Of the 920 patients, 22 (2.4% of the study population) were diagnosed with AAA; of these AAA patients, 86% were male, and 82% were over 65 years-old. Abdominal aortic size was weakly correlated with aortic root diameter (r=0.22, p<0.01). Although the proportions of male gender, hypertension, and dyslipidemia were higher in AAA patients, such differences were not statistically significant. Advanced age [odds ratio (OR)=1.07; 95% confidence interval (CI): 1.01-1.12; p<0.01], smoking (OR=3.44; 95% CI: 1.18-10.04; p=0.02), and peripheral arterial disease (OR=5.88; 95% CI: 1.38-25.05; p=0.01) were found to be associated with AAA. CONCLUSION: Although prevalence of AAA is very low in the Asian population, the prevalence of AAA in Asian CAD patients is higher than the general population. Therefore, opportunistic examination of the abdominal aorta during routine TTE could be effective, especially for male CAD patients over 65 years with a history of smoking or peripheral arterial disease.
Aged ; Aorta, Abdominal/ultrasonography ; Aortic Aneurysm, Abdominal/*complications/epidemiology/*ultrasonography ; Coronary Artery Disease/*complications/epidemiology/*ultrasonography ; Demography ; *Echocardiography ; Electrocardiography ; Female ; Humans ; Male ; Middle Aged ; Prevalence ; Risk Factors

PURPOSE: It is important to know the normal diameter of artery throughout the body so that clinicians are able to determine when an artery becomes aneurysmal. However, there are no previous studies on the normal diameter of arteries in the general Korean population. The purpose of this article is to determine the normal reference diameters of the abdominal aorta and iliac arteries in the Korean population. MATERIALS AND METHODS: We recruited the study population from three cities in Korea for the abdominal aortic aneurysm (AAA) screening. We measured the diameter of the aorta and iliac arteries. We analyzed the reference diameter of the population without AAA. The results were analyzed by Student's t-test and ANOVA on SPSS version 19. A p value <0.05 was considered to be statistically significant. RESULTS: One thousand two hundred and twenty-nine people were enrolled. 478 men and 751 women, with a mean age of 63.9+/-10.1 years (range 50 to 91) were examined. Eleven out of 1229 (0.89%) were diagnosed with AAA. In the population of 1218 people without AAA, the mean diameters (cm) of male/female were 2.20/2.11 (p<0.001) at suprarenal, 2.04/1.90 (p<0.001) at renal, 1.90/1.79 (p<0.001) at infrarenal, 1.22/1.17 (p<0.001) at right iliac and 1.47/1.15 (p=0.097) at the left iliac, respectively. There was a significantly larger diameter in the male population. The diameter of each level increased with age. CONCLUSION: The normal reference diameter of the infrarenal abdominal aorta in the Korean population is 1.9 cm in males and 1.79 cm in females. The diameter of the abdominal aorta increases with age.
Age Factors ; Aged ; Aged, 80 and over ; Aorta, Abdominal/*anatomy & histology/ultrasonography ; Aortic Aneurysm, Abdominal/diagnosis/epidemiology ; Female ; Humans ; Hypertension/complications ; Iliac Artery/*anatomy & histology ; Male ; Middle Aged ; Reference Values ; Republic of Korea ; Risk Factors