These findings were even more significant among blacks. For every one-unit change in a CAC score, blacks had four times higher increase in left ventricular mass compared with whites.
While progression in CAC over the follow-up was strongly related to higher left ventricular mass in blacks, this relationship was not significant in whites.
Blacks already face a greater risk and burden of heart disease and stroke: 60% of adult black men and 57% of adult black women have some form of cardiovascular disease, compared with 50% of white men and 43% of white women.
“Racial differences in our findings may be due to genetic factors or perhaps greater exposure to cardiovascular risk factors that usually appear earlier in blacks,” Moreira said. “We need more research to examine the link between coronary artery calcium and heart health.”
“Prior studies have shown that presence of CAC and higher CAC scores are associated with atherosclerotic cardiovascular disease in young to middle aged adults. The results of this study are important as they highlight that presence of CAC and higher CAC scores may also be associated with echocardiographic markers of subclinical LV systolic and diastolic dysfunction,” said Salim Virani, M.D., a member of the writing committee for the American Heart Association’s 2018 cholesterol guidelines and director of the Cardiology Fellowship Training Program at Baylor College of Medicine in Houston. “Given the burden of morbidity and mortality associated with heart failure, these are important findings. Prior studies from this cohort have also shown that a better risk factors profile in young adulthood is associated with much lower CAC and therefore, these results further highlight the importance of primordial prevention and risk factor modification in early adulthood.”
Co-authors are: Guilherme S. Yared, M.D.; Bharath A. Venkatesh, Ph.D.; Henrique D. Vasconcellos, M.D., M.Sc.; Chike C. Nwabuo, M.D., M.P.H.; Mohammad R. Ostovaneh, M.D.; Jared P. Reis, Ph.D.; Donald M. Lloyd-Jones, M.D., M.Sc.; Pamela J. Schreiner, Ph.D.; Cora E. Lewis, M.D., M.S.P.H.; Stephen Sidney, M.D., M.P.H.; John Jeffrey Carr, M.D., M.Sc.; Samuel S. Gidding, M.D.; and João A.C. Lima, M.D. Author disclosures are on the manuscript.
Data from The CARDIA study was used for this research. The CARDIA study is supported by the National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute (NHLBI), the Intramural Research Program of the National Institute on Aging (NIA), and an intra-agency agreement between NIA and NHLBI.
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