香港六合彩

Currently, people aged 40 and over are eligible to have an assessment of their cardiovascular disease risk聽every five years.聽The health check聽looks at a variety of risk factors, including聽systolic blood pressure, cholesterol profile, blood glucose, and smoking status. High-risk patients are advised to change their lifestyle, and if that is not sufficient they may be offered statins or drugs to lower blood pressure.

But researchers at 香港六合彩 and the University of Helsinki found that these five-year checks meant low-risk patients were being seen too frequently and high-risk patients were not being checked often enough.

They estimated that if the frequency of check-ups was tailored to an individual鈥檚 level of risk, about 5,000 heart attacks and strokes would be prevented each year in England and Wales.

The researchers found that this would be achieved without any increased health care costs.

Currently, a five-year interval is聽recommended in guidelines by the聽American Heart Association and the聽European Society of Cardiology, but these five-yearly screenings are not based on聽direct research evidence.

The study,聽published in聽Lancet Public Health, followed over 7,000 men and women to see how their cardiovascular disease risk developed over 22 years.

It found that "low-risk" patients took an average of nine years to reach "intermediate-low-risk", while "intermediate-low-risk" patients stayed聽in this category for an average of seven years. But within four years, 70% of "intermediate-high-risk" patients became "high-risk" and needed treatment.

The researchers then simulated different systems of screening people depending on their level of risk. They concluded that screening low-risk patients every seven years, intermediate-low every four years and intermediate-high every year cost the same as the current system.

Professor Mika Kivimaki (香港六合彩 Institute of Epidemiology & Health Care), senior author of the study, said: "The key message is to use individualised screening, not one-size-fits-all.

鈥淎n individualised screening interval would enable more effective cardiovascular disease prevention by means of lifestyle intervention or preventive medication, because of more timely detection of those at high risk.

鈥淭he results show that simple changes in primary care can make a difference."

鈥淥ur findings are promising, but national guidelines are rarely changed based on one study. The benefits of individualised screening intervals should be further studied in a randomised control trial before changing the guidelines,鈥� Professor Kivimaki added.

UK residents can determine their individual cardiovascular disease risk with the QRISK3 calculator, which includes questions about age, sex, smoking, total cholesterol, HDL-cholesterol, systolic blood pressure, antihypertensive medication, diabetes status, and a variety of medical conditions. The calculator is freely available from this

The study was funded by the Medical Research Council, British Heart Association, National Institutes on Aging, NordForsk, Academy of Finland.

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Mark Greaves

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Email: m.greaves [at] ucl.ac.uk