Abstract:

Background: Knowledge of the risk of cardiovascular disease (CVD) is important for its prevention.

Methods: Data from a non-clinical test for the absolute risk of having a heart attack or stroke for the first time in the next ten years is available from 3,271 35- to 69-year-old participants in the GEDA 2022 study without a diagnosis of heart attack or stroke. This risk was categorised as low (< 5 %), still low (≥ 5 % – < 7.5 %), increased (≥ 7.5 % – < 10 %) and high (≥ 10 %). In addition, the self-perceived CVD risk was asked as almost no, low, moderate and high risk.

Results: According to the CVD test, 73.5 % of adults were at low risk, 7.8 % were still at low risk, 6.0 % were at increased risk and 12.8 % were at high risk. In contrast, 28.7 % perceived themselves to be at almost no risk, 45.3 % at low risk, 20.4 % at moderate risk and 5.6 % at high risk of CVD. The higher the test-based risk, the lower the proportion of those who perceived themselves as having almost no or only a low risk. Nevertheless, half of the people with an increased to high risk according to the test result perceived themselves to be at almost no or only a low risk. The underestimation of risk was associated with lower education, better mental health and physical activity in both sexes.

Conclusions: People who underestimate their risk of CVD despite an unfavourable risk factor profile are a key target group for cardiovascular prevention.