According to a new study, having high blood pressure and high LDL (or “bad”) cholesterol, which are connected to genetics, increases the lifetime risk of getting coronary heart disease.
Furthermore, regardless of a person’s blood pressure and cholesterol levels in later years, experts claim that high blood pressure and high LDL cholesterol before the age of 55 are associated with a higher risk of coronary heart disease later in life.
As a result, the researchers write, there may be long-term consequences for high blood pressure and high LDL cholesterol on an individual’s subsequent risk of coronary heart disease.
Researchers add that it also reinforces the necessity for continued treatment for older persons and earlier intervention for these two coronary heart disease risk factors.
What is coronary heart disease?
Heart attacks can result from coronary heart diseaseTrusted Source, a disorder in which the heart’s arteries are unable to supply the organ with adequate oxygen-rich blood.
The accumulation of plaque in the heart’s arteries, or coronary artery disease, is the cause of this illness.
Living a healthy lifestyle, which includes eating well, controlling your weight, and engaging in regular physical activity, can lower your risk of developing coronary artery disease, even though plaque production can start early in life.
Similar to a genetic rendition of a randomized controlled trial, the new study is dubbed a Mendelian randomization studyTrusted Source.
Mendelian randomization is predicated on the idea that several gene variants, in this case those pertaining to blood pressure, are present in birth.
According to Dr. Dipender Gill, a clinical research fellow in the School of Public Health at Imperial College London who was not involved in the study, researchers “were able to consider individuals that have a genetic predisposition to higher blood pressure or cholesterol, and compare them to those that have predisposition to lower blood pressure or cholesterol” using this method.
This enables them to investigate the lifetime effects of LDL cholesterol and blood pressure on the risk of coronary heart disease.
More than 450,000 participants in the UK Biobank, a vast research resource with genetic, lifestyle, and health data, were involved in the study.
According to the study’s findings, people under the age of 55 who have a “genetic predisposition to higher LDL-C and blood pressure lead to a… higher likelihood of ultimately developing coronary disease,” Shapiro told Healthline.
According to that earlier study, older persons may not benefit from taking drugs to lower their LDL cholesterol and blood pressure.
They concluded that “our findings suggest that old age alone should not be a reason to withhold otherwise appropriate treatments aimed at lowering blood pressure and LDL cholesterol.”
The findings of the current study are consistent with a previous Mendelian randomization study conducted by Gill and colleagues, which discovered that high blood pressure in middle age can raise the risk of coronary artery disease in the future.The new paper’s authors state that their research emphasizes how critical it is to regulate blood pressure and low-density lipoprotein (LDL) cholesterol from an early age.
“Having a genetic predisposition to lower blood pressure or cholesterol still has a beneficial effect, even in younger individuals,” Gill told Healthline.
