History of Kidney Stones Linked With Coronary Heart Disease in Women

A new study reveals that a history of kidney stones has been linked with an increased risk of coronary heart disease (CHD) in women but not in men.

An analysis of data from three studies that involved a total of more than 240,000 participants from the National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey reported the prevalence of a history of kidney stones of 10.6 percent in men and 7.1 percent in women.

Pietro Manuel Ferraro, M.D., of Columbus-Gemelli Hospital, Rome, and colleagues analyzed the relation between kidney stones and risk of incident CHD for individuals with a history of kidney stones.

The analysis included 45,748 men and 196,357 women in the United States without a history of CHD at baseline who were participants in the Health Professionals Follow-up Study (HPFS) (45,748 men 40-75 years of age; follow-up from 1986 to 2010), Nurses' Health Study I (NHS I) (90,235 women 30-55 years of age; follow-up from 1992 to 2010), and Nurses' Health Study II (NHS II) (106,122 women 25-42 years of age; follow-up from 1991 to 2009).

The diagnoses of kidney stones and CHD were updated biennially during follow-up. Coronary heart disease was defined as fatal or nonfatal myocardial infarction (MI; heart attack) or coronary revascularization.

Of a total of 242,105 participants, 19,678 reported a history of kidney stones.

After up to 24 years of follow-up in men and 18 years in women, 16,838 incident cases of CHD occurred.

"Multivariable-adjusted analysis of individual outcomes confirmed an association in NHS I and NHS II participants between history of kidney stones and myocardial infarction and revascularization. After pooling the NHS I and NHS II cohorts, women with a history of kidney stones had an increased risk of CHD, fatal and nonfatal myocardial infarction, and revascularization," the authors write.

The study was published in the journal JAMA.

Source: ANI