Introduction:

Coordination between care levels centered in the severe, frequently and vulnerable diseases constitutes an essential element to increase the efficiency of the health system with the help of diagnostic means.

Objective:

To validate the modified Edinburgh Questionnaire for the diagnostic of arterial claudication in the primary health care.

Methods:

An assessment study of diagnostic instruments was done through of a cross-sectional, observational explicative study in a sample of 100 patients from primary health care. The study was conducted in the second semester (July-December) of 2016. A vascular physical exam was performed to all the participants where ankle- brachial pressure index was measured, the topography of the arterial occlusions of the lower limbs was identified, the modified Edinburgh Questionnaire was carried out; and the sensitivity, specificity, positive and negative predictive values and the diagnostic exactitude were calculated.

Results:

The vascular physical exam exhibited a predominant femoro-popliteal affectation (54,8%) followed of the aorta-iliac (29,9%). In the validation of the modified Edinburgh Questionnaire it was obtained a sensitivity of 98% and an specificity of 31,5% with high probabilities of false negative. The positive predictive value was 70% and the negative 92%. The exactitude of the diagnostic test was 73% for each test.

Conclusions:

The use of the modified Edinburgh Questionnaire in the primary health care is useful to establish the positive clinical diagnostic of an intermittent arterial claudication by Peripheral Arterial Disease.