Rebecka Hultgren

ABDOMINAL AORTIC ANEURYSMS: GENDER ASPECTS, PRESENCE OF MULTIPLE ANEURYSMS, REGIONAL ASPECTS ON PREVALENCE, AND DEVELOPMENT OF SELECTIVE SCREENING PROGRAMS

The prevalence of AAA is especially high in elderly men, and ruptured AAA causes 2 % of all deaths in men above 55 years in Sweden. The true mechanisms behind the development of disease remains partly unresolved as well as the skewed gender distribution in prevalence. Our group aims at investigating influential gender differences for AAA patients, some areas of special interest are; distribution of risk factors, hereditary patterns, rupture risk and reproductive history. We perform these projects in collaboration with Professor Alfredsson’s group at IMM; KI and Professor Per Eriksson's group at CMM. The difference in occurrence of concurrent aneurysms in women and men with AAA is investigated by prospective examinations of arterial walls in patients suffering from aneurysms, and radiological attempts to improve the understanding of the distribution of the disease, in cooperation with radiological expertise and Professor Gasser’s group at KTH. The influence of hereditary patterns on the risk to develop AAA in relatives has been shown in registry based investigations from our group. Further estimations of the true risk are made in on going sibling studies in collaboration with colleagues at KI at Södersjukhuset. The regional aspects on prevalence of the disease are investigated in population based registry studies, as well as analysis on risk factor profiles in different AAA cohorts in several regions in Sweden.