Low education exacerbates the effect of risk factors for cardiovascular disease

What is it about?

We investigated whether low education interacts with smoking, obesity and elevated blood pressure, exacerbating their unfavourable effects on cardiovascular disease risk in middle-aged Europeans.

Featured Image

Why is it important?

Our findings show that low education exacerbates the risk of cardiovascular disease among smokers and individuals with a cluster of smoking, elevated blood pressure and excess body weight. Socially disadvantaged subjects have most to gain from lifestyle and blood pressure modification, and their effective targeting to this end would both reduce the social gradient and the overall burden of cardiovascular disease in Europe.