Value of criterion and predictor variables for the study of coronary risk factors.

By means of the factor analysis and the discriminant analysis we studied the structure of the interrelations between the risk factor variables in cardiovascular diseases. The reduction of the dimensionality of data by extracting a small number of common factors has allowed us the identification of the three main factors whose structural change reflects the successive passage through the states of health, risk and illness. To estimate the effectiveness of the prevention action we calculated the D2 distance between the groups of subjects at the two extreme moments. In the last part of the study we determined the predictive value of the risk factor variables considering in turn the main risk factors as criterion variables in terms of the other risk factors taken as predictors.