Heart disease risk may be influenced by a surprising factor, new study finds

A person’s heart shape may be a predictor of future heart disease. new research It was discovered at Stanford University in California.

Specifically, hearts with a more spherical (round) shape may be 47% more likely to develop cardiomyopathy. According to the Mayo Clinic.

Analyze over 38,897 MRIs using artificial intelligence (AI). healthy mind UK Biobank researchers examined a large biomedical database containing information from 500,000 participants in the UK.

In the study, published Wednesday in the journal Med, researchers measured the circularity of the left ventricle. The left ventricle is a typical cone-shaped heart chamber that pumps oxygen-rich blood to the body.

A patient undergoes a cardiac examination. (Credit: Getty Images)

Researchers then analyzed the participants’ health records to identify those with specific genetic markers for heart disease.

They found an overlap between a round-shaped heart and a predisposition to heart disease.

Dr. Shore Clark, preventive cardiologist and instructor of medicine and pediatrics at Stanford University School of Medicine, said: Press release announcing the survey results.

Clarke was one of the senior researchers on this study, along with Dr. David Ouyang of the Smidt Heart Institute of Cedars-Sinai. in los angeles.

The first author was Milos Vukadinovic, a bioengineering student at UCLA.

The research team was surprised to find a strong link between roundness of the heart and risk of future cardiomyopathy, Clarke told Fox News Digital.

“The shape of the heart may not have told us anything different than measurements of heart size or strength,” he said.

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“However, the heart shape turned out to provide additional information About risk and genetics It is not detected by other measurements. ”

A round shape may indicate stress on the heart

Dr. Marc Siegel Clinical Professor, School of Medicine NYU Langone Medical Center A Fox News medical contributor says AI, when used properly, can be a “clinician’s ally” when assessing heart health.

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“In this case, AI showed me There is a correlation between a rounding of the heart and the development of cardiomyopathy, in which the heart swells and pumps less effectively,” Dr. Siegel told Fox News Digital.

“This makes some sense because the heart is usually more rectangular,” he explained.

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“A more rounded shape can put more stress and pressure on the valves and walls, which could lead to this result.” He was not involved in the new research.

If confirmed, the new study would add another element to how cardiologists examine patients’ echocardiograms (ultrasounds of the heart), Dr. Siegel said.

Medical images can hold more insight, researchers say

Researchers believe this is just the tipping point to more data-rich information from MRI images.

Clarke told Fox News Digital, “A key takeaway from our study is that while current strategies for assessing the heart are excellent, they predate the age of big data by decades. It means that it was established in

“We now have an opportunity to think more broadly and ask what other features of the heart tell us about disease risk and biology.”

Co-author Ouyang told the journal Med that there is a large amount of untapped information that doctors aren’t currently using.

The study authors indicated that more research is needed on how the shape of the heart can or should be considered when making medical decisions.

This particular study was limited to a single cohort within the UK

While surveying a large number of participants, Clark said the group lacked diversity.

“While we expect our results to generalize broadly, it is important to show that these findings are replicated in other populations.

According to US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) data, a person dies every 34 seconds due to heart disease.

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