Risk factors in the development of cardiovascular diseases

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Everybody has some risk of developing atheroma which may cause one or more cardiovascular diseases. However, certain 'risk factors' increase the risk. These include:

Lifestyle risk factors that can be prevented or changed:

o Smoking.
o Lack of physical activity (a sedentary lifestyle).
o Obesity.
o An unhealthy diet.
o Excess alcohol.

Treatable or partly treatable risk factors:

o Hypertension (high blood pressure).
o High cholesterol blood level.
o High triglyceride (fat) blood level.
o Diabetes.
o Kidney diseases that affect kidney function.

Fixed risk factors - ones that you cannot alter:

o A strong family history. This means if you have a father or brother who developed heart disease or a stroke before they were 55, or in a mother or sister before they were 65.
o Being male.
o An early menopause in women.
o Age. The older you become, the more likely you are to develop atheroma.
o Ethnic group. For example, people who live in the UK with ancestry from India, Pakistan, Bangladesh, or Sri Lanka have an increased risk.

Note: some risk factors are more 'risky' than others. For example, smoking and high blood pressure probably cause a greater risk to health than obesity. Also, risk factors interact. So, if you have two or more risk factors, your health risk is much more increased than if you just have one. For example, a middle aged male smoker who takes no exercise and has high blood pressure has a high risk of developing a cardiovascular disease such as a heart attack before the age of 60.

Therefore, the benefit of lowering a high blood pressure is to reduce the risk of developing a cardiovascular disease in the future.

For example, it is estimated that reducing a high diastolic blood pressure by 6 mmHg reduces your relative risk of having a stroke in the future by about 35-40%, and reduces your relative risk of developing heart disease by about 20-25%. Larger reductions in blood pressure provide greater benefits. (See leaflet called 'Risks of Disease - Absolute and Relative' for an explanation of relative risk. For a full discussion on exactly how much risk is reduced by lowering blood pressure, see the Hypertension Guidance produced by Clinical Knowledge Summaries.)