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Gout patients experienced greater risk for myocardial infarction
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Patients with gout had a higher risk for myocardial infarction, which was present even in younger adult patients and those without cardiovascular risk factors, according to study results.
“The risk of myocardial infarction in gout patients is high, even in those traditionally not considered to be of high risk,” researcher Shue-Fen Luo, MD, professor of medicine in the department of rheumatology, allergy and immunology at Chang Gung University in Taiwan, told Healio.com.
Shue-Fen Luo
Researchers used data collected from the Taiwan National Health Insurance database to identify 704,503 adults without history of myocardial infarction (MI), including 26,556 patients with gout (mean age, 55.4 years; 70.3% men) and 677,947 patients without gout (mean age, 42 years; 50.4% men). Patients were followed from Jan. 1, 2000 to the date of MI or the end of 2008.
There were 3,718 patients who had an MI (463 with gout, 3,255 without gout), and 299 died (35 with gout, 264 without gout). Incidence of MI was 2.20 per 1,000 patient-years for gout patients and 0.60 per 1,000 patient-years for those without gout (log-rank test, P<.001). Gout was associated with MIs (HR=1.23; 95% CI, 1.11-1.36), including nonfatal MIs (HR=1.26; 95% CI, 1.14-1.40) after adjusting for age, gender and history of diabetes mellitus, hypertension, coronary heart disease, stroke and end-stage renal disease. Adjusted for age and gender, patients without cardiovascular risk factors had gout associated with MIs (HR=1.84; 95% CI, 1.51-2.24) and nonfatal MIs (HR=1.80; 95% CI, 1.49-3.95). HRs decreased for all MI events as age increased (HR=1.59 for patients aged 20-44 years; HR=1.11 for patients aged 70 years and older).
While previous evidence had been limited to high-risk patients, Luo said the study surprising revealed that “[relative risks] of myocardial infarction in younger gout patients and those without DM or hypertension also increased.”
“In Taiwan, gout prevalence is among the highest in the world,” Luo said. “This major public health problem and the advantage of an available nationwide population database prompted our research.”
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