This drives home just how important a healthy lifestyle is for all of us, even those without an obvious genetic predisposition
- Hugh Markus
Stroke is a complex disease caused by both genetic and environmental factors, including diet and lifestyle. But could adhering to a healthy lifestyle offset the effect of genetics on stroke risk?
An international team led by researchers at the University of Cambridge decided to find out by investigating whether a genetic risk score for stroke is associated with actual ("incident") stroke in a large population of British adults.
They developed a genetic risk score based on 90 gene variants known to be associated with stroke from 306,473 white men and women in the UK Biobank - a database of biological information from half a million British adults.
Participants were aged between 40 and 73 years and had no history of stroke or heart attack. Adherence to a healthy lifestyle was based on four factors: non-smoker, diet rich in fruit, vegetables and fish, not overweight or obese (body mass index less than 30), and regular physical exercise.
Hospital and death records were then used to identify stroke events over an average follow-up of seven years.
Across all categories of genetic risk and lifestyle, the risk of stroke was higher in men than women.
Risk of stroke was 35% higher among those at high genetic risk compared with those at low genetic risk, irrespective of lifestyle.
However, an unfavourable lifestyle was associated with a 66% increased risk of stroke compared with a favourable lifestyle, and this increased risk was present within any genetic risk category.
Image: Healthy diet
Credit: U.S. Department of Agriculture
Reproduced courtesy of the University of Cambridge