A promising new study found that nearly all heart attacks, strokes, or other cardiac events were preceded by at least one addressable warning sign.
Researchers of a study published in the Journal of the American College of Cardiology examined data from 600,000 cases of cardiovascular disease in South Korea and 1,000 cases in the United States.
In more than 99% of cases of cardiovascular disease, heart failure, or stroke, the patients had at least one traditional risk factor, including smoking, elevated blood sugar, cholesterol, or blood pressure.
“Even ‘mild’ elevations of these 4 factors should be addressed with lifestyle treatments or medications,” said Dr. Philip Greenland, one of the study’s lead authors and a professor of preventive medicine and the Harry W. Dingman Professor of Cardiology at Northwestern University’s Feinberg School of Medicine in Chicago, per CNN.
Dr. Susan Cheng, professor and vice chair of research affairs in the department of cardiology at the Smidt Heart Institute at Cedars-Sinai Medical Center in Los Angeles, who was not involved in the research, says the findings are notable since they reinforce that doctors and patients have substantial control over the risk factors for nearly all heart disease cases.
Cheng notes that previous research has found that many cardiac events do not have any warning signs. However, the latest study, which examined broader medical data, found that the vast majority of people indeed possessed common and controllable risk factors.
In other words, said Cheng, if clinicians and patients want to limit their risk of heart disease, the best way to control risk factors is by lowering elevated cholesterol levels.
Dr. Ahmed Tawakol, a cardiologist at Massachusetts General Hospital and associate professor of medicine at Harvard Medical School, emphasizes the importance of getting restful sleep, managing stress and body weight, exercising regularly, and eating a nutritious diet.
“I’m hoping that the more we double down and show the efficacy of treating all these things together, that more people will combine these approaches and actually enjoy much longer health spans,” said Tawakol.