Simple fitness test 'could measure heart risk'
Thursday 19th May 2011
Doctors could use a simple fitness test to determine whether a middle-aged male patient is at high risk for heart attack and stroke, a study has indicated.
Research published in the Journal of the American College of Cardiology revealed that measuring how fast a middle-aged person can run a mile can help predict the risk of death from heart attack or stroke decades later.
Low levels of midlife fitness were found to be linked to significant differences in cardiovascular risk, according to the University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center.
The research indicated that a 55-year old man who took 15 minutes to run a mile would have a 30 per cent lifetime risk of heart disease as opposed to a man of the same age who takes just eight minutes and has a lifetime risk of less than ten per cent.
In other news, younger doctors have been found to be less likely to give lifestyle advice to heart patients but more likely to prescribe medication, according to research published in the International Journal of Clinical Practise.
Written by Martin Lambert
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