Executive Function Scores Tied to Stroke, Heart Attack Risk

The British Heart Foundation estimates that around 50,000 men and 32,000 women have a heart attack each year in England.

“While these results might not have immediate clinical translation, they emphasise that assessment of cognitive function should be part of the evaluation of future cardiovascular risk”, Sabayan noted.

Since lower scores on motor operate tests might indicate recent of blood vessels devastation inside the grey matter, the scientists envisioned an association to really attack risk, but have been amazed to notice a heightened risk for heart attack too, said Dr. Behnam Sabayan of Leiden University Medical Center inside the Netherlands.

Participants were categorised into one of three categories-low, medium or high-based on their levels of executive function, which was assessed using tests such as reading out names of colours written in different-coloured inks and following instructions to match numbers with letters.

People with poor planning, reasoning, and problem-solving skills may actually be at greater risk for heart attack and stroke, new research shows. None of the participants suffered from dementia, a brain condition marked by memory loss.

According to a new study from the Netherlands, lack of self-control and brain fog could signal an increased risk of heart attack or stroke.

For the study, researchers examined 3,926 people with an average age of 75 and without a history of heart attacks or strokes. All of the people involved had either a history of heart disease or an increased risk of heart disease from high blood pressure, diabetes or smoking.

There was no link between how good a person’s memory was, and their chance of heart attack or stroke.

In detail, of the 1,309 subjects with low executive function scores, 176 had a heart attack over the 3-year follow-up period, compared with 93 out of 1,308 individuals with high scores. There were 69 strokes among those with those with low scores, compared with 48 strokes among those with high scores. Incidence of stroke was 12.4 per 1,000 person-years, with low-scoring participants having a 51% (95% CI 0.99-2.30) higher risk of stroke than those who scored high in executive function.

Dr Sabayan added: “Performance on tests of thinking and memory are a measure of brain health”. Even so, worse executive function thinking skills could indicate disease of the brain vascular supply that may predict a higher likelihood of stroke and heart attacks.

The researchers point out that although their findings were statistically significant, the relative risks for heart attack and stroke among people with low executive function were small.