Association between metabolic risk factors and cardiovascular disease mortality: population-level analysis in high income countries

Mariachiara Di Cesare, Imperial College London
James Bennett, Imperial College London
Nicky Best, Imperial College London
Sylvia Richardson, Imperial College London
Majid Ezzati, Harvard University

Starting from the 1970s a consistent decline in the mortality level from cardiovascular diseases has been observed among high income countries. High systolic blood pressure, high serum total cholesterol, high and low fasting plasma glucose, and overweight/obesity are known risk factors for cardiovascular disease at the individual level but less is known about their associations at the population level. We will use data of previously reported estimations for risk factors and observed CVD mortality rates to disentangle the association at population level. A Negative Binomial regression, to account for over-dispersion, will be used to model the impact of the four metabolic risk factors on the level of cardiovascular disease mortality, separately for each sex. preliminary results show a changing pattern of association between risk factors and cardiovascular mortality by year, country, age, and sex.