Routine mammograms could help evaluate cardiovascular disease risk, study suggests

Routine mammograms could help assess cardiovascular disease risk in women, new research suggests.

The study found that both the severity of calcium in breast arteries and how it progressed on mammograms predicted future cardiovascular disease.

Researchers at Penn State College of Medicine analysed data from 10,348 women who had repeat mammograms, with an average of 4.1 years between scans.

The X-ray images can detect calcium in the breast’s arteries, a sign that blood vessels are stiffening.

As people age, calcium can build up in arteries, raising heart attack and stroke risk.

In the study, AI software assessed whether calcification was present and how severe it was.

Women with more severe calcification, and those whose calcification progressed over time, had up to two times higher risk of major events such as heart attack, stroke, heart failure and death.

Matthew Nudy is assistant professor of medicine and public health sciences at Penn State College of Medicine.

He said: “We know that women are more likely to be diagnosed at later stages of cardiovascular disease and have worse outcomes following a heart attack compared to men.

“That may be in part because the current cardiovascular risk assessment tools underestimate risk in women. We need better tools.

“In the future, assessment of breast arterial calcification may help improve our ability to predict risk and prevent cardiovascular disease.”

Vascular calcification was present in 19.4 per cent of participants at baseline.

Those who initially had no calcium but developed it on follow-up had a 41 per cent higher risk of an adverse cardiovascular event and death.

Nudy said: “This could be a way to use data that may already be available for different reason and to potentially use it to risk stratify an individual for the development of cardiovascular disease.”