Modifiable Lifestyle Factors Tied to Heart Failure Risk

Inverse association seen for the number of healthy lifestyle behaviors and heart failure risk

WEDNESDAY, Sept. 14 (HealthDay News) -- Modifiable lifestyle factors, including smoking, body mass index (BMI), physical activity, and vegetable consumption, decrease the risk of heart failure in Finnish men and women, according to a study published online Sept. 13 in Circulation: Heart Failure.

Yujie Wang, from the Pennington Biomedical Research Center in Baton Rouge, La., and colleagues assessed the association between lifestyle factors and the risk of heart failure in 18,346 Finnish men and 19,729 Finnish women (aged 25 to 74 years) without heart failure at baseline. Modifiable factors, such as smoking; BMI; physical activity; and vegetable, fruit, and alcohol consumption, were assessed. Individuals were followed up for a mean of 14.1 years.

The investigators found that 638 men and 448 women developed heart failure during the follow-up period. No significant association was found between fruit and alcohol consumption and the risk of heart failure, so these factors were not included in the analysis. The multivariable adjusted hazard ratio for heart failure associated with zero, one, two, three, and four healthy lifestyle factors (smoking, BMI, physical activity, and vegetable consumption) were 1.00, 0.69, 0.45, 0.34, and 0.31 for men, respectively, and 1.00, 0.53, 0.42, 0.24, and 0.19 for women, respectively.

"There was a graded inverse association between the number of healthy lifestyle factors and the risk of heart failure in Finnish men and women. Therefore, in order to reduce the incidence of heart failure, more efforts should be put into promoting healthy lifestyles and their associated health benefits," the authors write.

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