Role of infections in heart attacks
10 November, 2000
While a healthy lifestyle and diet have beneficial effects in preventing the risk of heart disease, new research in the United States has also suggested there is a link between infections and inflammation and the risk of heart attack and coronary heart disease for people over 65.
A study in the journal Circulation concluded that older adults who had been infected with the cold sore virus (herpes simplex virus 1), as indicated by the presence of antibodies to the virus, were twice as likely to suffer a heart attack or die from coronary heart disease than those who had not been infected with the virus.
In another study in the same issue of Circulation, researchers from the University of California in San Francisco found that people having heart attacks who had high levels of inflammation, indicated by an elevated white blood cell count, were less likely to survive the heart attack.
The researchers evaluated data from 975 people who had suffered heart attacks while participating in a previous study to assess a clot-dissolving drug. The patients’ white blood cell counts were measured at the time of treatment to ascertain inflammation.
Researchers found that patients with inflammation had reduced blood flow to the heart and the higher the white blood cell count, the higher the patient’s risk of death from heart attack or of developing congestive heart failure.
The National Heart Foundation (NHF) in Australia has identified coronary heart disease as the largest cause of death in Australia, with about 80 Australians dying every day as a result of it.
Last Reviewed: 03 April 2001
- 1. Circulation 2000; 102: 2329-2346
