Stress Test May Reveal a Man's Heart Risk
Stress Test May Reveal a Man's Heart Risk
Sept. 27, 2004 -- The exercise stress test is a useful screening tool for people with significant coronary artery disease. Now a major study say this test can also help predict future heart attacks in people with multiple risk factors even if they don't have heart disease.
Researchers with the Framingham Heart Study report that among symptom-free men with several risk factors for heart disease, poor performance on an exercisetreadmill test more than doubled the risk of a heart attack and other coronary artery events. The study also showed that exercise testing was of little or no value in people at low risk of future heart attacks.
Six days ago, researchers from The Cleveland Clinic reported similar findings in people without symptoms. The group they studied were said to be at high risk for heart disease using a risk assessment scoring system different from the one used in the Framingham study.
"The conclusions from these studies are remarkably similar," Framingham researcher Gary J. Balady, MD, tells WebMD. "Both studies suggest that exercise testing is of little benefit in low-risk men who are asymptomatic and that the risk for asymptomatic, high-risk men who perform poorly on an exercise stress test may be even higher than we have thought."
The newly released study, to be published in the Oct. 5 issue of the American Heart Association journal Circulation, included 1,431 men and 1,612 women.
Researchers calculated a 10-year heart disease risk for all participants using the Framingham Risk Score. This assigns a point value to risk factors such as high blood pressure, total cholesterol, HDL cholesterol, age, diabetes, and smoking history. A person's total score is used to predict the risk of heart attack or chest pain over the following decade.
People with a risk score of 9% or less are considered at low risk for such events, while those with a score of 20% or more are considered at high risk.
The average age of the study participants was 45, and all were followed for roughly 18 years after having an exercise stress test. During follow-up, 225 men (16%) and 81 women (5%) experienced a coronary event such as heart disease-related death, chest pains, or heart attack.
Researchers with the Framingham Heart Study report that among symptom-free men with several risk factors for heart disease, poor performance on an exercisetreadmill test more than doubled the risk of a heart attack and other coronary artery events. The study also showed that exercise testing was of little or no value in people at low risk of future heart attacks.
Six days ago, researchers from The Cleveland Clinic reported similar findings in people without symptoms. The group they studied were said to be at high risk for heart disease using a risk assessment scoring system different from the one used in the Framingham study.
"The conclusions from these studies are remarkably similar," Framingham researcher Gary J. Balady, MD, tells WebMD. "Both studies suggest that exercise testing is of little benefit in low-risk men who are asymptomatic and that the risk for asymptomatic, high-risk men who perform poorly on an exercise stress test may be even higher than we have thought."
Determining Risk
The newly released study, to be published in the Oct. 5 issue of the American Heart Association journal Circulation, included 1,431 men and 1,612 women.
Researchers calculated a 10-year heart disease risk for all participants using the Framingham Risk Score. This assigns a point value to risk factors such as high blood pressure, total cholesterol, HDL cholesterol, age, diabetes, and smoking history. A person's total score is used to predict the risk of heart attack or chest pain over the following decade.
People with a risk score of 9% or less are considered at low risk for such events, while those with a score of 20% or more are considered at high risk.
The average age of the study participants was 45, and all were followed for roughly 18 years after having an exercise stress test. During follow-up, 225 men (16%) and 81 women (5%) experienced a coronary event such as heart disease-related death, chest pains, or heart attack.
