Early detection is key to preventing heart attacks, meaning a new questionnaire that identifies individuals at high risk of cardiovascular disease could be a powerful tool in saving lives.
Developed by a team of researchers from Sweden, the 5-minute test has been shown to have the same accuracy as blood tests and blood pressure measurements in detecting the likelihood of fatty deposits in the arteries, making it a quick and easy assessment that doesn’t require a trip to the doctor.
“A heart attack often comes out of the blue,” says clinical physiologist Göran Bergström, from the University of Gothenburg. “Many of those who suffer heart attacks are apparently healthy and asymptomatic, but have fatty deposits in the coronary arteries, known as atherosclerosis.”
The self-report tool consists of 14 different questions covering age, sex, weight, diabetes status, blood pressure, lipid levels, family history, and smoking habits. The researchers say it should take between five and eight minutes to answer.
More than 25,000 participants aged 50 to 64 answered these questions as part of the ongoing SCAPIS (Swedish Cardiopulmonary BioImage Study) project. The researchers compared their answers against computed tomography (CT) scans that had also been gathered as part of SCAPIS.
Since CT scans reveal signs of fatty deposits in the arteries, the team could link the self-reported answers with actual coronary atherosclerosis, which could then be used to extrapolate heart attack risk.
Tested on a smaller subsection of the SCAPIS data, the method detected 64.6 percent of people at the highest risk of cardiovascular disease.
A clinical tool was then used as a comparison, which incorporated all 14 self-reported factors as well as nine additional factors derived from lab tests and vital signs like blood pressure.
Using the clinical tool, the team identified 67.3 percent of highest-risk individuals, suggesting self-reported data alone can effectively screen for heart attack risk, with only a slight improvement gained from clinical visits.
Going forward, the team behind the new study is looking to expand the testing of the process to wider groups of people in other countries, to see if there are the same relationships between heart attack risk and the questionnaire responses.
The idea isn’t to use the self-reporting tool in isolation, but to flag individuals who may need to get checked out further by a doctor. The hope is that people who need treatment or need to make lifestyle changes can be found earlier.
A heart attack occurs when blood flow to part of the heart is blocked and the muscle is deprived of oxygen, usually due to built up plaque in a coronary artery rupturing and forming a blood clot. A whole host of factors can potentially be involved – from air pollution to work stress – and the work continues to prevent them ahead of time.
“If we can make the test widely available within healthcare, it can save lives and prevent suffering by helping us to identify those who are at high risk of heart attack or who are currently undertreated,” says Bergström.
The research has been published in the Journal of the American Heart Association.
