CVD Risk Calculator – Cardiovascular Disease 10-year Risk

The CVD risk calculator is a tool that enables you to calculate your risk for developing severe cardiovascular complications within the following ten years. Our cardiovascular risk calculator is based on the results of the Framingham Study and requires only basic laboratory data and a patient's medical history to calculate their risk. Don't be afraid; use our CV risk calculator to estimate your risk of heart disease. It may be the motivation you need to change your daily habits!

If you are interested in our health-related calculators, don't hesitate to check also the sleep calculator and the calorie calculator.

We try our best to make our Omni Calculators as precise and reliable as possible. However, this tool can never replace a professional doctor's assessment.

The term cardiovascular disease can refer to different heart or blood vessel problems. The most critical risk factor for developing cardiovascular disease is damaging the heart or blood vessels by atherosclerosis and hypercholesterolemia.

Too much cholesterol in your blood is the primary reason why atherosclerosis develops. Atherosclerosis is when fatty plaque begins to build up in your arteries, which thickens and stiffens the artery walls, and plugs the lumen of the artery, which can inhibit blood flow through your arteries to your organs and tissues, including the muscles of your heart.

At first, patients usually don't have any symptoms, but eventually, it causes:

• Coronary artery disease (including heart attack);
• Stroke;
• Peripheral arteries disease;
• Chronic kidney failure.

This is why it is so important to know, and regulate your cholesterol levels, control your diet to keep your ideal weight, exercise regularly, and countless other factors are already known to minimize the risk of atherosclerosis and its consequences!

Use our macronutrient calculator to calculate macros, or choose the calorie deficit calculator to find the optimal way to lose weight safely.

The Framingham Heart Study is a long-term cohort study under the direction of the National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute (NHLBI), formerly known as the National Heart Institute, in collaboration with Boston University.

The study began in 1948 with 5209 adults from Framingham, Massachusetts, and now it is on its third generation of participants. Before this study, there was no data on the epidemiology of hypertension or atherosclerotic cardiovascular disease. In the scientific world, it is considered an outstanding source of evidence because of its complexity and duration.

More than 1000 original medical papers have been published based on the Framingham Heart Study. The major findings from that study are as follows:

• Smoking cigarettes, being obese, having a high cholesterol level, and elevated blood pressure increases the risk of heart disease.
• Exercise and high levels of HDL cholesterol reduce the risk of heart disease.
• Elevated blood pressure increases the risk of a stroke.
• Filtered cigarettes do not lower the risk of heart disease, as opposed to smoking without a filter.

A dedicated calculator is available to learn more about this important study: framingham risk calculator.

Our CVD risk calculator is based on the article General Cardiovascular Risk Profile for Use in Primary Care, published in 2008 in the medical journal Circulation by a group of scientists conducted by Dr. D'Agostino.

In their study, the authors describe a statistical model that assesses the 10-year risk of developing cardiovascular disease among primarily healthy persons. Thanks to this work, you can use our heart disease risk calculator and check your risk for developing:

• Coronary heart disease (including heart attack);
• Cerebrovascular disease (including stroke);
• Peripheral vascular disease; and
• Heart failure.

This CV risk calculator was prepared based on the medical history of 8491 Framingham study participants. Analysis of the statistics revealed that a patient's risk of developing heart disease depends on their:

• Sex;
• Age;
• Total cholesterol;
• High-density lipoprotein (HDL) cholesterol;
• Systolic blood pressure;
• Treatment for hypertension;
• Smoking; and
• Diabetes.

For each of these features, you may receive anywhere from -3 to +15 points (depending on your sex) – these are the so-called CVD points. The more points you get, the bigger your risk of cardiovascular disease is. Then, these points are converted into percentages – they reflect the risk of developing at least one cardiovascular disease in the next ten years.

If you are interested in the details of how the CVD risk calculator works, take a look at the tables presented in the original article.

If you want to know your risk of developing cardiovascular disease, follow these steps using our cardiac risk calculator!

1. Choose your sex.
2. Fill in your age (note that this calculator has been validated for only people older than 30 years).
3. Fill in your basic laboratory data – HDL cholesterol and total cholesterol.
4. Write down your average systolic blood pressure and choose if you are treated for hypertension.
5. Choose whether you are a smoker and/or a diabetic.
6. And that's it! You've got your result!

Now, let's take some examples.

A 61-year-old woman, not treated for high blood pressure, who has a total cholesterol of 180 mg/dL, HDL of 47 mg/dL, and systolic blood pressure of 124 mm Hg, and is a current smoker but is not diabetic.

She has an estimated 10-year cardiovascular risk of 10%.

A 53-year-old man on treatment for systolic blood pressure, who has a total cholesterol of 161 mg/dL, HDL of 55 mg/dL, and systolic blood pressure of 125 mm Hg, and is diabetic but is not a current smoker.

He has an estimated 10-year cardiovascular risk of 15.6%.