Mayo Clinic Health Manager
Get free personalized health guidance for you and your family.
Get Started
close window
Housecall Archives
About our e-newsletters
- Free e-newsletters
- Mayo Clinic expertise
- We do not share your e-mail address
Housecall, our weekly general-interest e-newsletter, keeps you up to date on a wide variety of health topics with timely, reliable, practical information, recipes, blogs, questions and answers with Mayo Clinic experts and more. Our biweekly topic-specific e-newsletters also include blogs, questions and answers with Mayo Clinic experts, and other useful information that will help you manage your health.
Housecall Archives
close window
Mayo Clinic Housecall
Stay up to date on the latest health information.
What you get
- Free weekly e-newsletter
- Mayo Clinic expertise
- Recipes, tools and other helpful information
- We do not share your e-mail address
Risk factors
By Mayo Clinic staffCertain factors contribute to the unwanted buildup of fatty deposits (atherosclerosis) that narrow arteries throughout your body, including arteries to your heart. You can improve or eliminate many of these risk factors to reduce your chances of having a first or second heart attack.
Heart attack risk factors include:
- Age. Men who are 45 or older and women who are 55 or older are more likely to have a heart attack than younger men and women.
- Tobacco. Smoking and long-term exposure to secondhand smoke damage the interior walls of arteries — including arteries to your heart — allowing deposits of cholesterol and other substances to collect and slow blood flow. Smoking also increases the risk of deadly blood clots forming and causing a heart attack.
- Diabetes. Diabetes is the inability of your body to adequately produce or respond to insulin properly. Insulin, a hormone secreted by your pancreas, allows your body to use glucose, which is a form of sugar from foods. Diabetes can occur in childhood, but it appears more often in middle age and among overweight people. Diabetes greatly increases your risk of a heart attack.
- High blood pressure. Over time, high blood pressure can damage arteries that feed your heart by accelerating atherosclerosis. The risk of high blood pressure increases as you age, but the main culprits for most people are eating a diet too high in salt and being overweight. High blood pressure can also be an inherited problem.
- High blood cholesterol or triglyceride levels. Cholesterol is a major part of the deposits that can narrow arteries throughout your body, including those that supply your heart. A high level of the wrong kind of cholesterol in your blood increases your risk of a heart attack. Low-density lipoprotein (LDL) cholesterol (the "bad" cholesterol) is most likely to narrow arteries. A high LDL level is undesirable and is often a result of a diet high in saturated fats and cholesterol. A high level of triglycerides, a type of blood fat related to your diet, also is undesirable. However, a high level of high-density lipoprotein (HDL) cholesterol (the "good" cholesterol), which helps the body clean up excess cholesterol, is desirable and lowers your risk of heart attack.
- Family history of heart attack. If your siblings, parents or grandparents have had heart attacks, you may be at risk, too. Your family may have a genetic condition that raises unwanted blood cholesterol levels. High blood pressure also can run in families.
- Lack of physical activity. An inactive lifestyle contributes to high blood cholesterol levels and obesity. People who get regular aerobic exercise have better cardiovascular fitness, which decreases their overall risk of heart attack. Exercise is also beneficial in lowering high blood pressure.
- Obesity. Obese people have a high proportion of body fat (a body mass index of 30 or higher). Obesity raises the risk of heart disease because it's associated with high blood cholesterol levels, high blood pressure and diabetes.
- Stress. You may respond to stress in ways that can increase your risk of a heart attack. If you're under stress, you may overeat or smoke from nervous tension. Too much stress, as well as anger, can also raise your blood pressure.
- Illegal drug use. Using stimulant drugs, such as cocaine or amphetamines, can trigger a spasm of your heart muscle that causes a heart attack.
References
- Heart attack. National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute. http://www.nhlbi.nih.gov/health/dci/Diseases/HeartAttack/HeartAttack_All.html. Accessed Oct. 1, 2009.
- American Heart Association. 2005 Guidelines for cardiopulmonary resuscitation and emergency cardiac care. Circulation. 2005;112:1S.
- Ewy GA. Cardiocerebral resuscitation should replace cardiopulmonary resuscitation for out-of-hospital cardiac arrest. Current Opinion in Critical Care. 2006;12:189.
- Hefland M, et al. Emerging risk factors for coronary heart disease: A summary of systematic reviews conducted for the U.S. Preventive Services Task Force. Annals of Internal Medicine. 2009;151:496.
- U.S. Preventive Services Task Force. Using nontraditional risk factors in coronary heart disease risk assessment: U.S. Preventive Services Task Force recommendation statement. Annals of Internal Medicine. 2009;151:474.
- Chobanian AV, et al. The seventh report of the Joint National Committee on Prevention, Detection, Evaluation, and Treatment of High Blood Pressure. New England Journal of Medicine. 2003;289:2560.
- Stimulants. National Institute on Drug Abuse. http://teens.drugabuse.gov/facts/facts_stim2.php. Accessed Oct. 1, 2009.
- King SB, et al. 2007 update of the ACC/AHA/ SCAI 2005 guideline update for percutaneous coronary intervention. Circulation. 2008;117:261.
- Antman EM, et al. Use of nonsteroidal antiinflammatory drugs: An update for clinicians. Circulation. 2007;115:1634.
- Shaw LJ, et al. Optimal medical therapy with or without percutaneous coronary intervention to reduce ischemic burden. Circulation. 2008;117:1283.
- Rind DM, et al. Intensity of lipid lowering therapy in secondary prevention of coronary heart disease. http://www.uptodate.com/home/index.html. Accessed Oct. 1, 2009.
- Alcohol, wine and cardiovascular disease. American Heart Association. http://www.americanheart.org/presenter.jhtml?identifier=4422. Accessed Oct. 1, 2009.
- Sexual activity and heart disease or stroke. American Heart Association. http://www.americanheart.org/presenter.jhtml?identifier=4714. Accessed Oct. 1, 2009.
- Lightwood JM, et al. Declines in acute myocardial infarction after smoke-free laws and individual risk attributable to secondhand smoke. Circulation. 2009;120:1373.
