Simple Test Measures Heart Attack Risk

According to the Society of Interventional Radiology, about 25 percent of all heart attacks or sudden cardiac deaths in the United States occur in individuals thought to be at low risk. The Society asserted at its annual convention recently that a simple and inexpensive test–the ankle brachial index (ABI)–along with traditional risk scoring systems–such as the Framingham Risk Score–has the potential to prevent devastating heart attacks in thousands of individuals who are not originally thought to be at high risk (according to Framingham alone).

In their study, information was analyzed from the 1999-2004 National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey (NHANES)–a nationally representative cross-sectional survey of the U.S. population for 6,292 men and women ages 40 and older without known history of heart disease, stroke, diabetes or atherosclerotic vascular disease–along with available data on standard cardiovascular risk factors and screening tests (like the ABI, which is a comparative blood pressure test). For the first time, researchers determined the prevalence of peripheral arterial disease (PAD) in a large population of women and men who were not considered at high risk for cardiovascular disease. And the results are surprising: novel risk factors (those not traditionally considered in the Framingham Risk Score) are abnormal in up to 45 percent of those not considered high risk for coronary heart events.

(photo credit: stockexchg)