Heart Failure Predictors

Cardiologists at Emory University School of Medicine have found a way to independently predict if someone is at risk of heart failure. This is accomplished by testing blood levels of resistin, a hormone produced by fat cells in the body.

Javed Butler, MD., MPH director of heart failure at Emory University stated that, "this is the strongest predictor of new-onset heart failure that we have found." This method can also be used for other biomarkers and risk factors such as diabetes and high blood pressure.

For every 10 nanograms per milliliter increase in resistin levels in the blood, the risk of onset heart failure goes up 38%.

"Considering the increasing number of people who are obese or have diabetes, very many of them are going to be at some level of risk for heart failure later in life," Butler says. "The value of a marker such as resistin may be in accurately identifying among this large population of at-risk individuals who is at the highest risk and then targeting interventions to those people."

These findings were presented Nov.12 at the American heart Association Scientific Sessions conference in New Orleans.

You can find more on this research by clicking on this site, Science Daily.