Quantification of epicardial fat with cardiac CT angiography and association with cardiovascular risk factors in symptomatic patients: From the ALTER-BIO (alternative cardiovascular bio-imaging markers) registry

PURPOSE We aimed to assess the association between features of epicardial adipose tissue and demographic, morphometric and clinical data, in a large population of symptomatic patients with clinical indication to cardiac computed tomography (CT) angiography. METHODS Epicardial fat volume (EFV) and adipose CT density of 1379 patients undergoing cardiac CT angiography (918 men, 66.6%; age range, 18–93 years; median age, 64 years) were semi-automatically quantified. Clinical variables were compared between diabetic and nondiabetic patients to assess potential differences in EFV and adipose CT density. Multiple regression models were calculated to find the clinical variables with a significant a…