Wednesday, September 19, 2007

Blog 014 - what's your HEART score?

On Saturday September 22, 2007 on Fitness Rocks Podcast 064 I will have an interview with medical researcher Dr. Arch Mainous from the Medical University of South Carolina. We will be discussing his work in developing the HEART score which is a simple scoring system designed to assess ten year risk of coronary heart disease based on self-reported data. I have reproduced the HEART score for men and women in this blog post so you can get your own score. This is not intended as medical diagnosis, advice, or treatment. Regardless of the results you get with this test, you should discuss them with your personal doctor.

HEART Score for women:

RISK FACTOR - POINTS
Age (years)
45 - 49 - 0
50 - 54 - 2
55 - 59 - 2
60 - 64 - 2
History of Hypertension - 2
History of High Cholesterol - 2
History of Diabetes - 4
Smoking Status
Never - 0
Former - 0
Current - 3
Body Mass Index
<30 - 0
>30 - 1

Estimated 10-year risk - Total Points
<10% - 0 - 6
10 - 20% - 7 - 9
>20% - 10 - 14


HEART Score for men:

RISK FACTOR - POINTS
Age (years)
45 - 49 - 0
50 - 54 - 0
55 - 59 - 2
60 - 64 - 2
Family History of Heart Disease - 2
History of Hypertension - 1
History of High Cholesterol - 2
History of Diabetes - 2
Smoking Status:
Never - 0
Former - 0
Current - 2
Physical Activity:
Often or very often - 0
Sometimes - 0
Seldom or never - 1

Estimated 10-year risk Total Points
<10% - 0 - 2
10 - 20% - 3 - 5
>20% - 6 - 12

MAKE SURE YOU DO THE HEART SCORE THAT IS CORRECT FOR YOUR GENDER.

Do not draw any conclusions about your individual risk of having a heart attack or developing heart disease from this score without first discussing the results with your personal doctor. I encourage you to print out this blog and take it to your next doctor's visit. Check out Fitness Rocks Podcast 064, Saturday, September 22, 2007 to listen to an interview with Dr. Mainous, the medical researcher who developed the HEART score.

An abstract of Dr. Mainous' article can be found by clicking this link to the American Jounal of Cardiology.

Monte Ladner, M.D.
www.fitnessrocks.org

3 comments:

SallyT said...

I haven't listened to the podcast yet but I'm surprised that there isn't anythin inthe score to measure lifestyle activities beyond smoking. I guess that the assumption is that those factors will show up in cholesterol and BMI #'s. I'm anxious to hear the podcast.

Unknown said...

I listened to and enjoyed the podcast, thank you! However when taking the test I didn't understand the notation used in the BMI or the results part -

Body Mass Index
<30>30 - 1

Estimated 10-year risk - Total Points
<10%>20% - 10 - 14

??

How do I use these?
Thanks

Dr. Monte said...

Timothy,

Thanks for pointing out the mistake - the formatting must have gotten messed up in the process of posting the blog. It's hard to get a table formatted on this blog.

I've corrected the problem. However, make sure you do the test that is appropriate for your gender - there is a different test for men and women. BMI is not included in the test for men.

Monte