Do you have a family history of heart disease?  Does it matter?  This is Dr. Steven Andrew Davis, Speaking of Health.  We’ve always taught that a history of heart disease in your parents is an important predictive factor for yourself – but just how helpful is it?  A report published in the Journal of the AMA looked at offspring of participants in the Framingham study – a multi-decade chronologue of heart disease and its risk factors.

 The goal was to assess the predictive value of a family history of cardiovascular disease as an independent risk factor from over 2,000 offspring of Framingham study participants.  The typical son and daughter followed was 44 years old and the evaluations were done every 4 years.   

And the envelope please:  after adjusting for the other risk factors of heart disease, it turns out that a family history of premature heart disease – and by that they mean a cardiovascular problem in a father younger than 55 and a mother younger than 65 – that history of early heart disease in a parent increased the risk for male offspring two-fold.  The risk for women was increased slightly, but was not judged to be statistically significant.  This means that family history alone was an independent predictor of cardiovascular disease in some men and that, given other risk factors they might have, suggests they be given extra attention or medical care to prevent them from having the same problems as do their parents. 

              For a copy of this script, access our web site, speakingofhealth.com.  Speaking of Health, I’m Dr. Steven Andrew Davis for CBS News.

 Ref:  JAMA 2004 May 12; 291:2204-11