Healthy Habits in Middle Age Increase Cardiovascular Disease-Free Longevity

A new study reveals that maintenance of optimal risk factor levels during middle age is associated with substantially longer years lived free of cardiovascular disease (CVD).

Researchers at the Northwestern University Feinberg School of Medicine (Chicago, IL, USA; www.feinberg.northwestern.edu) reviewed the pooled survival analysis of 905,115 person-years of data from 1964 through 2008 from five community-based cohorts. All participants were free of CVD at baseline for risk factor data--blood pressure (BP), total cholesterol (TC), diabetes, and smoking status--and total CVD outcome data. The researchers calculated lifetime risk estimates of total CVD by index age (45, 55, 65, 75 years), risk factor strata, and then estimated years lived free of CVD across risk factor strata.

The results showed that the overall lifetime risk for total cardiovascular disease from ages 45 to 95 was 60% for men and 55% for women. The lifetime risk of CVD was 30% at age 45, and at age 75 the risk increased to 52% for women and 54% for men. But those with optimal risk factor profiles at age 45 lived about 14 years longer free of total CVD, compared with those with at least two major risk factors in middle age. Total CVD risk for men was greater than that for women across all ages, but staying active in middle age and meeting standards to keep risk factors low significantly improved event-free survival. The study was published online on November 5, 2012, in the Journal of the American Medical Association (JAMA).

“The lifetime risk estimates for total cardiovascular disease were high for all individuals, even those with optimal risk factors in middle age,” concluded lead author John Wilkins, MD, MS, and colleagues. “Maintenance of optimal risk factors through ages 45, 55, and 65 years may not guarantee a life free from total CVD, but it increases the probability that more years will be lived free of CVD.”

For the study, the researchers pooled survival data from the Framingham Heart Study, the Framingham Offspring Study, the Atherosclerosis Risk in Communities Study, the Chicago Heart Association Detection Project in Industry Study, and the Cardiovascular Health Study. All five studies were funded by the US National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute (Bethesda, MD, USA;).

Related Links:
Northwestern University Feinberg School of Medicine
National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute