Carotid extra-medial thickness does not predict adverse cardiovascular outcomes in high-risk adults

The arterial adventitia has been implicated in the vascularremodelling process of atherosclerosis. Carotid extra-medialthickness (EMT) is a reproducible non-invasive measure ofelastic artery adventitial thickness obtained by high-resolutionultrasound [1,2]. Carotid EMT is correlated with both intima-media thickness (IMT) and arterial stiffness from the samearterial segment, yet is associated with cardiovascular risk fac-tors including BMI and diabetes independent of atheroscleroticinvolvement of the arterial intima and media [1,3–5].The prognostic significance of carotid EMT, however, hasnot yet been examined. Thus, we sought to determine whethercarotid EMT is associated with risk of incident cardiovascularevents, in adults at risk of coronary artery disease (CAD).