Parental-Offspring Association of Age of Onset of Coronary Heart Disease or Stroke A Prospective Cohort Study of Parents and Offspring

Objective: To investigate the effect of parental age of onset of coronary heart disease (chd) or stroke on age of onset of chd or stroke in offspring. Design: Inception cohort study. Method: The association between age of onset of chd or stroke in offspring and maternal age of onset of chd or stroke and the association between age of onset of chd or stroke in offspring and paternal age of onset of chd or stroke were assessed using the cox proportional hazard model after conditionally imputing the censored parents (i.E. Parents who did not experience chd or stroke during the study). Results: Parental age of onset of chd was predictive of offspring age of onset of chd for both maternal age of onset of chd (p < 0.0001 N=1378) and for paternal age of onset of chd (p=0.0005 N=1194). A negative estimate of the coefficient of interest signifies that late onset of coronary heart disease in parents is protective of onset of chd in offspring. Beer intake and hdl were important confounding variables associated with parental and offspring age of onset chd. Conclusions: Using cox proportional hazard model, we found that late onset of chd or stroke in parents is cardioprotective for offspring. Parental age of onset of chd or stroke is associated with offspring age of onset of chd, and this relationship is described for each unit increase or decrease of age of onset using these statistical methods. This relationship suggests that data on parental history can be useful in the clinical setting in the determination of risk among those at intermediate levels of predicted risk using existing risk calculators.