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Posted on Jan 29, 2004, 11 a.m.
By Bill Freeman
Roughly nine out of ten heart attacks affect people who have at least one cardiac risk factor, say researchers from Northwestern University in Chicago. Dr Philip Greenland and colleagues analyzed data from three studies that surveyed nearly 400,000 subjects. Results showed that 92% of men and 87% of women who suffered a heart attack had at least one of four risk factors, often for many years before they experienced any trouble.
Roughly nine out of ten heart attacks affect people who have at least one cardiac risk factor, say researchers from Northwestern University in Chicago. Dr Philip Greenland and colleagues analyzed data from three studies that surveyed nearly 400,000 subjects. Results showed that 92% of men and 87% of women who suffered a heart attack had at least one of four risk factors, often for many years before they experienced any trouble. The risk factors taken into account in the study were smoking, hypertension, high cholesterol, and diabetes. Greenland says that the findings dispute claims that approximately half of people who suffer heart attacks and other cardiac incidents do not have any risk factors. Results of a second study appearing in the same issue of JAMA support Greenland’s findings. Umesh Khot of Indiana Heart Physicians in Indianapolis and colleagues found that 85% of people with angina or those who underwent angioplasty or similar treatments had at least one of the same four risk factors. This study also showed that smokers tended to suffer a cardiac incident roughly a decade before patients who had one of the other risk factors.
SOURCE/REFERENCE: JAMA 2003;290:891-897, 898-904.
