CHARACTERISTICS OF THE INDIVIDUAL AS GUIDEPOSTS TO THE PREVENTION OF HEART DISEASE

Abstract

A study of healthy young individuals is being made to discover factors which point toward the later development of high blood pressure or coronary heart disease. Evidence was found to show that the occurrence of these conditions in an individual''s family provides a modest lead in this direction. Various traits exhibited by normal young persons themselves are thought to provide even more reliable indications. When a given subject has both a positive family history and significant individual characteristics, these 2 circumstances point quite strongly toward the possibility of future cardiovascular disease. By using these guideposts, it is thought that subjects with high susceptibility to hypertension and coronary heart disease can be identified. Measures for preventing these diseases can then be tested in such a group. Heretofore, the problem has been approached almost entirely from what is learned in the study of individuals after such conditions have developed, leaving most of the essential facts about the precursors of hypertension and coronary artery disease in the realm of conjecture.