MONDAY, Nov. 1, 2004 (HealthDayNews) -- There may be a strong genetic component to deaths caused by cardiac valve diseases, which seem to run in families, says a study in the current issue of Circulation.
The study found that first-degree relatives of people who died of mitral valve disease -- siblings, parents, or children -- were 2.5 times more likely to also die of it. Second-degree relatives of people who died of mitral valve disease, meanwhile, were 67 percent more likely to die of the same cause.
"These findings suggest that unknown genetic factors contribute to death due to mitral valve disease and death due to non-rheumatic aortic valve disease. Future studies will attempt to discover the genes responsible for such risk," study author Benjamin Horne, a Ph.D. candidate in genetic epidemiology at the University of Utah's department of medical informatics, said in a prepared statement.
He and his colleagues used the Utah Population Database to examine death certificates and genealogy data of people who died of aortic and mitral valve disease.
"While some small studies have suggested that some types of mitral valve disease may aggregate in families, this study used a population database that included millions of individuals across several centuries with their genealogical relationships to each other and with 250,000 death certificates for those from the 20th century," Horne said.
More information
The American Heart Association has more about heart valves.
