Introduction:

The incidence of abdominal aortic aneurysms in the population benefits from the incorporation of ultrasound to diagnostic methods due to the importance of their early detection.

Objective:

To describe the characteristics of patients who are early detected with an abdominal aortic aneurysm.

Method:

A descriptive, cross-sectional study was conducted in 243 patients belonging to the health area of "General Freyre de Andrade” Clinical- Surgical Hospital that were classified as a risk population (men > 50 years and women > 60 years). The study was conducted from November 2016 to October 2017.

Results:

The diagnosis of abdominal aortic aneurysm was performed in 2.1 % (n= 5); in these patients predominated the age group of 70 to 79 years (80 %), male sex (60 %) and white skin color (80 %). The predominant risk factors were smoking habit, arterial hypertension and peripheral arterial disease; all with equal percentage (100 %). The most affected aortic segment was the infrarenal (100 %), the predominant aortic diameters were: transversal (3-3.9 cm), longitudinal (5-10 cm) and anterior-posterior (3-3.9 cm). The C-reactive protein increased (greater than 5 mg/L) in 100 % of the cases. Intermittent claudication was the most frequent.

Conclusions:

Although the percentage prevalence of the disease was low, it was present in all the patients with abdominal aortic aneurysm, risk factors that are favorable to aneurysms, high concentrations of C-reactive protein, affectation in the infrarenal aortic segment, and high percentage of ages of more than 70 years.