Forty-year mortality from cardiovascular diseases and all causes of death in the US Railroad cohort of the Seven Countries Study

Alessandro Menotti, Daan Kromhout, Henry Blackburn, David Jacobs, Mariapaola Lanti

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31 Scopus citations

Abstract

Forty-year mortality and its association with entry risk factor levels is reported in men employed in the US Railroad industry within the Seven Countries Study of Cardiovascular Diseases. Cardiovascular risk factors were measured in 2571 men aged 40-59 at entry examination in 1957-1959 and after 5 years. Mortality data were collected during 40 years of follow-up (overall mortality of 83.4%). The main causes of death were coronary heart disease (CHD, 32.9% of all causes using strict criteria), atherosclerotic cardiovascular diseases (including coronary, stroke and peripheral artery diseases, (ACVD), 53.2% of all causes) and cancer (25.1% of all causes). Multivariate analysis showed that age, systolic blood pressure, serum cholesterol and cigarette consumption were strongly and significantly associated with all-cause mortality, coronary mortality and cardiovascular mortality. Multivariate relative risks per 5 years of age were 1.31 for all-causes, 1.32 for CHD and 1.36 for ACVD; per 20 mmHg systolic blood pressure were 1.12, 1.23 and 1.26, respectively; per 1 mmol/l of serum cholesterol were 1.06, 1.18 and 1.14, respectively; and per 10 cigarettes smoked per day were 1.14, 1.12 and 1.13, respectively. During a 40-year period classical cardiovascular risk factors were highly predictive of coronary, cardiovascular and all-cause mortality in a US working population.

Original languageEnglish (US)
Pages (from-to)417-424
Number of pages8
JournalEuropean Journal of Epidemiology
Volume19
Issue number5
DOIs
StatePublished - May 2004

Bibliographical note

Funding Information:
This analysis has been supported in part by a grant to one of the authors (HB) from the Martinson Clinic Foundation, Wayzata, Minneapolis, MN, USA, and by Medrisk srl, Rome, Italy.

Keywords

  • Cardiovascular diseases
  • Prediction
  • Risk factors

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