Childhoold trauma can take a toll on a person’s mental health, and as a new study suggests, an adult’s heart health.
Kids who experience trauma, abuse, neglect and family dysfunction are at increased risk of having heart disease in their 50s and 60s, according to a new Northwestern Medicine study.
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The study was published in the most recent edition of the Journal of the American Heart Association.
Results from the study showed people exposed to the highest levels of childhood family environment adversity were more than 50% more likely to have a cardiovascular disease event such as a heart attack or stroke over a 30-year follow-up, Kristin Samuelson wrote for Northwestern.
According to Northwestern, children who experience trauma face higher rates of lifelong stress, smoking, anxiety, depression and sedentary lifestyle that persist into adulthood. These can lead to increased body mass index, diabetes, increased blood pressure, vascular dysfunction and inflammation.
“This population of adults is much more likely to partake in risky behaviors — for example, using food as a coping mechanism, which can lead to problems with weight and obesity,” said first author Jacob Pierce, a fourth-year medical student at Northwestern University Feinberg School of Medicine. “They also have higher rates of smoking, which has a direct link to cardiovascular disease.”
Although Pierce suggested counseling might help adults deal with smoking or overeating, he said more research is needed.
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The study used the Coronary Artery Risk Development in Young Adults Study, which has followed participants from recruitment in 1985-1986 through 2018 to determine how childhood environment relates to cardiovascular disease incidence and mortality in middle age.
“Early childhood experiences have a lasting effect on adult mental and physical well-being, and a large number of American kids continue to suffer abuse and dysfunction that will leave a toll of health and social functioning issues throughout their lives,” said senior author Joseph Feinglass, research professor of medicine and of preventive medicine at Feinberg. “Social and economic support for young children in the United States, which is low by the standards of other developed countries, has the biggest ‘bang for the buck’ of any social program.”
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