A major new study has revealed that warning signs such as high blood pressure, elevated cholesterol, or raised glucose levels precede almost all cases of heart attack or stroke, challenging the belief that these events strike without warning.
Researchers from Yonsei University College in South Korea and Northwestern University in the US analysed health records of over nine million people in South Korea and nearly 7,000 in the US, tracking their health for up to two decades. The study, published in the Journal of the American College of Cardiology (JACC), examined four major risk factors: high blood pressure, high cholesterol, high blood sugar, and smoking.
The findings showed that 99 per cent of those who experienced a major cardiac event had non-optimal levels of at least one risk factor, and 93 per cent had two or more. Non-optimal levels included past tobacco use, blood pressure over 120/80 mmHg, total cholesterol over 200 mg/dL, and fasting glucose over 100 mg/dL.
High blood pressure was the most common culprit, affecting over 95 per cent of patients in South Korea and over 93 per cent in the US. Even among women under 60, often considered at lowest risk, more than 95 per cent had at least one risk factor before heart failure or stroke.
Study co-author Professor Philip Greenland from Northwestern University said: 'We think the study shows very convincingly that exposure to one or more non-optimal risk factors before these cardiovascular outcomes is nearly 100 per cent. The goal now is to work harder on finding ways to control these modifiable risk factors.'
