Leg length linked to heart disease risk
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Having longer legs may put you at lower risk of heart disease, new findings show.
In an analyses of data from 12,254 men and women aged 44 to 65, Dr. Kate Tilling of the University of Bristol in the UK and colleagues found a direct association between leg length and intimal-medial thickness (IMT), a measurement of the thickness of blood vessel walls used to detect the early stages of atherosclerosis, or hardening of the arteries.
The longer a person’s legs, they found, the thinner their carotid artery walls were, indicating less buildup of deposits within these blood vessels and a lower risk of heart disease and stroke.
Leg length is strongly affected by early life factors, Tilling and her team point out in their article in the American Journal of Epidemiology. For example, studies have linked breastfeeding, high-energy diets at age two and four years, and affluent childhood circumstances to longer leg length.
To investigate whether leg length might also be related to early signs of heart and blood vessel disease—which would in turn support a connection between early life factors and heart attack and stroke risk—the researchers compared leg length to IMT of the carotid artery in a group of men and women participating in a large study of atherosclerosis risk. They estimated leg length by subtracting a person’s height when seated from his or her total height.
Leg length was directly linked to IMT, the researchers found, with the relationship being strongest for black men and weakest for black women.
The study “provides some support for the hypothesis that early life factors, such as breastfeeding and childhood nutrition, which are associated with greater prepubertal linear growth, may reduce cardiovascular disease risk,” Tilling and her colleagues conclude.
SOURCE: American Journal of Epidemiology, July 15, 2006.
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