Evaluation of the Femoral Artery IMT as a Risk Factor of Cardiovascular Disease

Purpose: The carotid artery intima-media thickness (IMT) is a risk factor for atherosclerosis that can predict the association of cardiovascular disease. Despite this, there have been few studies on the femoral artery IMT. This study examined the correlation between the carotid and femoral IMT. The findings suggest that both the carotid and femoral IMT need to be measured for a proper evaluation of early arterial disease. Methods: This retrospective study included 39 patients who underwent carotid artery duplex, lower extremity duplex, and coronary artery angiography or CT for a health checkup in the authors’ health promotion center from January 2015 to December 2017. The carotid and femoral IMT were measured at three places from bifurcation using B-mode. The coronary artery disease (CAD), carotid artery stenosis (CAS), and peripheral artery occlusive disease (PAD) were defined by stenosis over 50% in duplex and CT angiogram. The maximum and sum of the IMT in both the arterial disease group and no arterial disease group were compared. Results: This study included 25 patients with arterial diseases from 39 enrolled patients 22 patients with CAD (51.2%), eight patients with CAS (20.5%), and seven patients with PAOD (17.9%). The total arterial disease including any one of the above three arterial diseases correlated with the maximum values of the femoral IMT (R = 0.322, P = 0.023) and the sum of the femoral IMT (R = 0.346, P = 0.015). Conclusion: The femoral artery IMT correlated with the carotid artery IMT. In addition, the femoral artery IMT correlated with the occurrence of total arterial disease, including coronary, carotid, and peripheral artery occlusive disease, but the correlation was lower than that of the carotid IMT.