The Goldman cardiac risk index is a well known guide to risk in non-cardiac surgery, although the vascular component of the original dataset was relatively small, and it anteceded widespread use of ECHO (which may account for its paltry point score for aortic stenosis - diagnosed by the presence of a murmur consistent with valvular stenosis).

Detsky remarked that Goldman underestimated the risk for vascular patients and so devised a similar scheme from a vascular surgical dataset. The simplified points allocation and the addition of limiting angina as an independent determinant are features of note.

Our surgical colleagues are beloved of POSSUM in its various manifestations and, indeed, it forms the basis of their prototype comprehensive vascular surgical audit (to which our society hopes to make a significant contribution).

Please have fun with the on-line risk calculators that David Wilson-Nunn has made available:

(If you are a non-medical visitor to this site please bear in mind that these calculations of risk merely serve as a guide. The outcomes for combinations of clinical variables are specific to the time and place of derivation of each index and should not be applied to your local hospital, which is likely to have different facilities and a different profile of health in the population that it serves.)