Cardiology Letters 2022, 31(2):94-99

Cardiovascular risk clusters in 2 813 hospitalised seniors

Dúbrava M, Jánošiová J

I. klinika geriatrie LFUK a UN Bratislava, Slovenská republika

Background: Cardiovascular (CV) diseases are distinctive for seniors. Cardiology has been working intensively with risk factors (RF) in recent decades. Their concurrence amplifies the CV risk.

Aim: To estimate the prevalence of diabetes (DM), arterial hypertension (AH), dyslipidaemia (DLP), obesity and their clustering in hospitalised patients older than 64 years.

Patients and methods: A retrospective observational study with 2 813 unique hospitalised patients (mean age of 78.9 years).

Results: AH occurred in 85.4%, DLP in 53.2%, DM in 34.3% and obesity in 27.0%. AH, DLP and obesity were significantly more frequently diagnosed in survivors. Patients had 2.0 of analysed diseases on average; this number was significantly higher in survivors than in the deceased (2.05 vs 1.76; p < 0.001). The prevalence of AH increased until the age of 84, the prevalence of DM and DLP culminated 5 and 10 years earlier, thereafter significant decreases followed (from 38.6% to 26.3%, p < 0.001 and 58.9% to 38.2%, p < 0.001, respectively). The prevalence of obesity was stationary between the age of 65 - 79 years (about 33%), then decreased sharply and continuously (to 12.3%, p < 0.001). This is mirrored in the decreasing number of analysed diseases by age (both the mean disease number and the proportion of patients with more diseases decreased): at the same time the proportion of patients who have no more than one disease studied increased significantly after the age of 70 years - from 26.5% to 46.0% (p < 0.001) in nonagenarians.

Conclusion: The study proved high prevalence of analysed diseases in advanced age and their important clustering.

Keywords: cluster; diabetes mellitus; arterial hypertension; dyslipidaemia; obesity; geriatrics; polymorbidity

Published: February 1, 2022  Show citation