Female vessels age faster
Women's blood vessels outstripped men's in the rate of aging
Maria Azarova, Naked Science
Scientists from Cedars-Sinai Medical Center, a leading Los Angeles clinic and respected academic center, have found that women's blood vessels age faster than men's. According to the authors of the study, which is published in the journal JAMA Cardiology (Hongwei et al., Sex Differences in Blood Pressure Trajectories Over the Life Course), the findings will help explain some significant gender differences in cardiovascular risk.
According to Susan Cheng, head of the research team, their results challenge the long-standing belief that vascular diseases and the risk of their occurrence in women lag behind men by 20 years.
"Many of the doctors have long believed that women are catching up with men in terms of their cardiovascular risk," explains Cheng. "Our study not only confirms that women have a different biology and physiology, but also illustrates why women may be more susceptible to the development of certain types of cardiovascular diseases at different times life. <...> We focused on a more thorough study of the trajectories of blood pressure throughout the life of women, comparing them with data on men, because the vast majority of the processes of cardiovascular diseases, as a rule, begin with an increase in blood pressure. This is the main risk factor."
The team studied the data of almost 145 thousand blood pressure measurements of more than 32 thousand people aged five to 98 years, which were carried out for 43 years. As it turned out, women's blood pressure rises already at the age of 30 and continues to grow faster than men throughout their lives.
Instead of comparing data on women with data on men, scientists compared women with women and men with men: according to the results, vascular functions in women begin to differ greatly from men's over time. Despite the fact that most men develop heart disease at an earlier age, women show signs of increased blood pressure much earlier.
"Our data showed that the increase in blood pressure in women begins at an earlier age. Therefore, if we define the hypertension threshold in the same way, then a 30-year-old woman with high blood pressure is likely to have a higher risk of developing cardiovascular disease than a man with high blood pressure at the same age," adds Cheng.
According to the authors of the work, their findings confirm the need for further research on the health of the female heart and may become a reminder to doctors that the treatment of cardiovascular diseases should be built taking into account the gender of the patient.
"Lifestyle changes, such as regular exercise, proper nutrition, and quitting smoking and excessive alcohol consumption are the first things women can do if they experience an increase in blood pressure," said cardiologist Lawrence Krakow, who was not involved in the study.
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