Unhealthy habits linked to cardiovascular risk at 75 and older
Heart attack or stroke rates were 30.64 per 1,000 person-years among those with all three unhealthy habits, versus 17.09 among those with none.
Our read
Populations- Studied:
- Cohort study of 869,781 adults aged 75 years and older, mean 6.7 years (Dose-response)
- What changed:
- Cardiovascular risk was higher with unhealthy lifestyle behaviors (adjusted hazard ratio 1.528 for score 3 against 0)
- The catch:
- Diet quality, frailty, and cognitive status were not measured and could confound the risk
Editor of record: Boris Djordjevic · AgingResearch.News
Korean adults aged 75 and older without prior cardiovascular disease were followed in an observational cohort study of 869,781 people. Their average age was 78.5, and 41.7% were men. Follow-up averaged 6.7 years.
The researchers assigned one point each for current smoking, drinking at least 30 grams of alcohol daily, and not meeting regular exercise thresholds. They recorded 120,353 first heart attacks or strokes. Event rates rose with each additional point. The highest-score group had 30.64 events per 1,000 person-years, versus 17.09 in the zero-score group; person-years combine the number of people and their follow-up time. The association remained after accounting for measured health and demographic differences and for deaths before a cardiovascular event.
Why it matters
Cardiovascular disease causes substantial illness and death in older age. The authors argued that preventing first events, particularly through smoking cessation and physical activity promotion, remained a priority well beyond midlife.
Caveats
Illness may have reduced participants’ activity before enrollment, even though the analysis excluded deaths and cardiovascular events in the first year. Participants volunteered for health screening and were relatively healthy and mobile, limiting application to frailer, institutionalized or cognitively impaired adults and those with prior heart attacks or strokes.
From the paper
- Participants
A total of 869,781 participants were included in the final study population (mean age, 78.49 ± 3.48 years; male, 41.67%).
- Follow-up
The mean follow-up duration was approximately 6.7 years (Fig. 1).
- Result
Compared to the reference group with a score of 0, the adjusted subdistribution HRs were 1.173 (95% CI 1.153–1.194), 1.481 (95% CI 1.445–1.519), and 1.528 (95% CI 1.437–1.626) for scores of 1, 2, and 3, respectively.
- Limitation
This reliance on self-report in older adults makes the data highly susceptible to recall error and social desirability bias, particularly concerning sensitive behaviors like heavy alcohol intake and exercise.
Quoted word for word from the full text on nature.com.
Exercise is part of Bryan Johnson's Blueprint
The paper
Hallym University Sacred Heart Hospital
Scientific Reports, Jul 20, 2026, Open access
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