Consequences of using different methods to assess cardiovascular risk in primary care.

Background: There are two promising methods to assess cardiovascular risk: the Adult Treatment Panel III (ATPIII) and the Systematic Coronary Risk Evaluation (SCORE). The ATPIII calculates the 10-year risk of coronary events based on an adaptation of the original Framingham function. The SCORE chart is based on European studies and measures the absolute risk of cardiovascular mortality in the next 10 years.