Risk factor by 55

Risk of Cardiac Death Pretty Much Set by 55

By Crystal Phend, Senior Staff Writer, MedPage Today Published: January 25, 2012 Reviewed by Robert Jasmer, MD; Associate Clinical Professor of Medicine, University of California, San Francisco. Two or more major risk factors at age 55 predicted a 29.6% chance of death from cardiovascular disease by age 80 for men and 20.5% for women, Donald M. Lloyd-Jones, MD, of Northwestern University in Chicago, and colleagues found.Even a couple of traditional cardiovascular risk factors in middle age spell high lifetime risk for the heart, researchers affirmed. But for 55-year-olds with a clean bill of cardiovascular health, lifetime risk was only 4.7% for men and 6.4% for women in the analysis of patient-level data from more than 250,000 individuals across 18 longitudinal studies. The effect was similar for heart attacks and strokes and regardless of race or era in which one was born, the group reported in the Jan. 26 issue of the New England Journal of Medicine. Risk assessment typically considers only short-term risk, such as 10-year risk with the Framingham prediction tool, the group noted. "However, the majority of adults in the U.S. who are considered to be at low risk for cardiovascular disease in the short term are actually at high risk across their remaining lifespan," Lloyd-Jones and colleagues wrote./.../