A new study to be presented at the American College of Cardiology’s 67thAnnual Scientific Session suggests individuals diagnosed with inflammatory bowel disease (IBD) are at an increased risk for heart attack, irrespective of traditional risk factors including elevated cholesterol, elevated blood pressure and smoking.

The CDC estimates three million Americans live with IBD, and 70,000 new cases are diagnosed every year, per 2015 statistics. To assess the potential correlation between IBD and heart attack risk, researchers analyzed the electronic medical records of more than 17 million patients from 26 nationwide healthcare systems. Adult patients between the 18 and 65 years old with an IBD diagnosis between a three-year period were identified. Researchers reviewed patients with and without IBD who had heart attacks.

Researchers reported less than 2 percent of the study cohort had IBD. Those with IBD were more likely to have diabetes, high blood pressure, high cholesterol and smoking habits.

“Younger patients had about nine times the risk of a heart attack compared to their peers in the same age group (who didn’t have IBD), and this risk continued to decline with age,” said lead author Muhammad S. Panhwar, MD, Case Western Reserve University/University Hospitals Cleveland Medical Center in Cleveland and colleagues. “Our findings suggest that IBD should be considered an independent risk factor for heart disease.”

Other primary findings include:

• Heart attacks occurred approximately twice as often in individuals with IBD.
• Patients with IBD had approximately a 23 percent higher risk of having a heart attack.
• Among study subjects under 40, women with IBD had a higher risk of heart attack than men with IBD.
• In study subjects over 40, both men and women had similar heart attack risk.

“Our study adds considerably to a growing set of literature highlighting the importance of chronic inflammation in IBD as having a role in the development of heart disease,” the researchers said.

The researchers believe their study will open up more opportunities to assess the link between IBD and heart disease and will hopefully also have an effect on patient-physician conversations about the patient’s personal risk of cardiovascular disease.