Atherosclerosis is the main cause of morbidity and mortality in adults in Brazil and worldwide. Classical risk factors have shown its causal association from randomized experimental studies, such with cholesterol and hypertension. Other risk factors, including abdominal adiposity, show positive associations with atherosclerosis-related outcomes.

The ELSA-Brazil observational study began collecting data in 2008 with clinical, epidemiological and laboratorial variables of 15,105 public servants aged 35 to 74 years. Several articles on these data have already been published and have brought relevant information about the association between risk factors and varied outcomes. In the present issue, Michaela Eickemberg et al. present data from a cross-sectional study that explores different measures of abdominal adiposity and its association with carotid intima-media thickness (C-IMT) measurement.

[…]