Abstract
BackgroundThis research study aimed at assessing the electrocardiographic (ECG) changes caused by ageing in a cohort of healthy subjects with normal echocardiographic examinations.MethodsA total of 219 healthy individuals (119 males and 100 females) were evaluated for possible arrhythmias with a standard 12-lead resting ECG and 24-h Holter ECG. As the recordings were performed between 1998 and 2000, a 20-year follow-up study was carried out by assessing the local medical records to investigate whether the subjects had experienced any cardiovascular health complications or disease since the baseline assessment.ResultsEighty-three subjects (45 males and 38 females) presented with pathological ECG findings at baseline. The most common finding on analysis of Holter ECG recordings was premature atrial contractions, and the most severe pathological finding was episodes of ventricular tachycardia (eight subjects). Regarding the analysis of the standard 12-lead ECG, the most common finding was left ventricular hypertrophy, and the most severe pathological findings were ST-T changes and prolongation of the QT interval. Despite other cardiac examinations performed on these patients showing normal results, in combination with a strict inclusion criterion, this study showed that 28% of all subjects had pathological resting 12-lead ECGs at rest and 35% had pathological heart rhythms when assessed by 24-h Holter ECG. At follow-up, 21% of females and 43% of males had presented with ECG abnormalities, and 30% of females and 36% of males had cardiovascular disease. There was hypertension in 45% of females and in 58% of males. However, no association was found between the follow-up findings and ECG changes seen at baseline.ConclusionAlthough most ECG changes found at baseline could be considered as a normal variation, they may progress to more severe heart complications as the subject ages. The results of this study also validate ECG findings of previous studies and underline that diagnostic criteria should be based on gender and age.
Highlights
Today, people are living longer than ever before, and it has become even more important to distinguish between normal ageing-related cardiovascular changes and pathological cardiovascular conditions
We performed a 20-year follow-up study to assess for development of cardiovascular health complications based on a review of medical records
This study aimed to describe age-related changes in ECG carried out in the cohort of healthy subjects from Northern Sweden and to compare our findings with previously published normal values
Summary
People are living longer than ever before, and it has become even more important to distinguish between normal ageing-related cardiovascular changes and pathological cardiovascular conditions. Controls are often randomly selected from the population and included if they pass an initial clinical investigation and fit the selection criteria Such a control group was included in a general population study in Umeå, Sweden, where the aim was to identify normal cardiovascular changes due to ageing in otherwise healthy subjects, with a particular focus on determining reference values for use in echocardiographic (echo) examinations of patients [1]. As the recordings were performed between 1998 and 2000, a 20-year follow-up study was carried out by assessing the local medical records to investigate whether the subjects had experienced any cardiovascular health complications or disease since the baseline assessment. The results of this study validate ECG findings of previous studies and underline that diagnostic criteria should be based on gender and age
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