Abstract

The study aimed to characterize the major cardiovascular risk factors using Framingham Risk Score (FRS) among Saudis. A cross-sectional study was conducted to investigate the expected 10 years FRS for cardiovascular diseases (CVD) among Saudi subjects. In the present study there was a significant association between the 10 years risk of developing CHD and BMI. The results revealed an increase in BMI contributing to significant increase in the 10 years risk of CHD among males. The overall distribution of FRS among males regardless the BMI category as a percentage of the total male subjects revealed that males were at low, medium and high CHD risk of 71.4%, 14.27% and 14.3%, respectively. However, female subjects showed 91.5%, 4.8% and 3.6% at low, medium and high FRS, respectively. Moreover, significant increases in the Odd ratio amounting to 4.58 and 5.24 among intermediate and high risk males in comparison with female ones, respectively. BMI strongly correlates with the expected 10 years FRS for CVD. Also there is a gender specific susceptablity for CVD risk among Saudi males compared to female ones. Socioeconomic, behavioral, awareness about healthy choices and genetic characteristics of obesity should be taken in consideration since extrapolating other population’s studies to Saudi one might be misleading.

Keywords: Obesity; Cardiovascular diseases; Framingham; Body mass index