**1. Introduction**

Risk factors for cardiovascular disease (CVD) are specific lifestyles, behaviors and a set of conditions that increase likelihood of CVD. An individual may have more than one cardiovascular (CV) risk factors. In fact, CV risk factors often appear coherently. The more risk factors, the greater the risk of CVD. However, the individual with increased risk does not necessarily develop cardiovascular diseases.

A number of factors have been linked to an increased risk of cardiovascular disease which can be classified as (1) Unmodifiable risk factors: age (men over 45 years old, women over 55 years old), gender and family history of early CVD (men under 55 years old, women under 65 years old) and (2) Modifiable risk factors: unhealthy diets, high blood pressure, dyslipidemia, smoking, overweight, obesity, pre-diabetes or diabetes, sedentary lifestyle [1–3].

In addition, extended CV risk factors were proposed, including: metabolic syndrome (insulin resistance syndrome, syndrome X) including triglyceridemia, chronic kidney disease (CKD) with reduced glomerular filtration rate [15–59 ml/min/1.73 m2 ], chronic inflammatory conditions (rheumatic disease, HIV), early menopause (< 40 years), history of eclampsia, high-risk ethnicity (South Asian), elevated lipoprotein (a) [Lp(a)] ≥ 50 mg/dL (≥ 125 nmol/L) or elevated apolipoprotein B

(ApoB) ≥ 130 mg/dL, C-reactive protein (CRP) ≥ 2 mg/L and ankle-brachial index <0.9 [4].

Residual CV risk factor is defined as the risk of CV events that persists despite achieving treatment goals for low-density lipoprotein cholesterol (LDL-C), blood pressure and blood glucose as recommended by current evidence-based guidelines [5, 6]. Residual CV risk factors include LDL-C > 100 mg/dL, high-sensitive C-reactive protein (hsCRP) > 2 mg/l, triglyceride (TG) > 200 mg/dL, high-density lipoprotein cholesterol (HDL-C) < 40 mg/dL, Lp(a) > 50 mg/dL [7]. The origin of residual CV risk factors in dyslipidemia is based on atherogenic dyslipidemia characterized by elevated TG and triglyceride-rich lipoproteins (TRLs), decreased HDL-C, and qualitative changes of lipoprotein particles [8–10].
