You are here

Article Text

Article menu
Download PDFPDF
Cardiac risk factors and prevention
Original research
Recreational substance use among patients with premature atherosclerotic cardiovascular disease
  1. Dhruv Mahtta1,2,3,
  2. David Ramsey1,
  3. Chayakrit Krittanawong2,
  4. Mahmoud Al Rifai2,
  5. Nasir Khurram4,
  6. Zainab Samad5,
  7. Hani Jneid2,6,
  8. Christie Ballantyne6,
  9. Laura A Petersen1,3,
  10. Salim S Virani1,2,3,6
  1. 1Health Policy, Quality & Informatics Program, Michael E. DeBakey VA Medical Center Health Services Research & Development Center for Innovations in Quality, Effectiveness, and Safety, Houston, Texas, USA
  2. 2Section of Cardiology, Department of Medicine, -Baylor College of Medicine, Houston, Texas, USA
  3. 3Section of Health Services Research, Department of Medicine, Baylor College of Medicine, Houston, Texas, USA
  4. 4Division of Cardiovascular Medicine, Methodist DeBakey Heart & Vascular Center, Houston Methodist Hospital, Houston, Texas, USA
  5. 5Department of Medicine, The Aga Khan University, Karachi, Sindh, Pakistan
  6. 6Section of Cardiovascular Research, Department of Medicine, Baylor College of Medicine, Houston, Texas, USA
  1. Correspondence to Dr Salim S Virani, Baylor College of Medicine, Houston, Texas, USA; virani{at}bcm.edu

Abstract

Objective Despite an upsurge in the incidence of atherosclerotic cardiovascular diseases (ASCVD) among young adults, the attributable risk of recreational substance use among young patients has been incompletely evaluated. We evaluated the association of all recreational substances with premature and extremely premature ASCVD.

Methods In a cross-sectional analysis using the 2014–2015 nationwide Veterans Affairs Healthcare database and the Veterans wIth premaTure AtheroscLerosis (VITAL) registry, patients were categorised as having premature, extremely premature or non-premature ASCVD. Premature ASCVD was defined as having first ASCVD event at age <55 years for men and <65 years for women. Extremely premature was defined as having first ASCVD event at age <40 years while non-premature ASCVD was defined as having first ASCVD event at age ≥55 years for men and ≥65 years for women. Patients with premature ASCVD (n=135 703) and those with extremely premature ASCVD (n=7716) were compared against patients with non-premature ASCVD (n=1 112 455). Multivariable logistic regression models were used to study the independent association of all recreational substances with premature and extremely premature ASCVD.

Results Compared with patients with non-premature ASCVD, patients with premature ASCVD had a higher use of tobacco (62.9% vs 40.6%), alcohol (31.8% vs 14.8%), cocaine (12.9% vs 2.5%), amphetamine (2.9% vs 0.5%) and cannabis (12.5% vs 2.7%) (p<0.01 for all comparisons). In adjusted models, the use of tobacco (OR 1.97, 95% CI 1.94 to 2.00), alcohol (OR 1.50, 95% CI 1.47 to 1.52), cocaine (OR 2.44, 95% CI 2.38 to 2.50), amphetamine (OR 2.74, 95% CI 2.62 to 2.87), cannabis (OR 2.65, 95% CI 2.59 to 2.71) and other drugs (OR 2.53, 95% CI 2.47 to 2.59) was independently associated with premature ASCVD. Patients with polysubstance use had a graded response with the highest risk (~9-fold) of premature ASCVD among patients with use of ≥4 recreational substances. Similar trends were observed among patients with extremely premature ASCVD. Gender interactions with substance use were significant (p-interaction <0.05), with recreational substance use and premature ASCVD showing stronger associations among women than in men with premature ASCVD.

Conclusions All subgroups of recreational substances were independently associated with a higher likelihood of premature and extremely premature ASCVD. Recreational substance use confers a greater magnitude of risk for premature ASCVD among women. A graded response relationship exists between increasing number of recreational substances used and higher likelihood of early-onset ASCVD.

  • stroke
  • peripheral vascular disease
  • smoking cessation
  • coronary artery disease
  • cardiac risk factors and prevention

Data availability statement

All data relevant to the study are included in the article or uploaded as supplementary information. The Veterans wIth premaTure AtheroscLerosis (VITAL) registry.

https://doi.org/10.1136/heartjnl-2020-318119

Statistics from Altmetric.com

    Request Permissions

    If you wish to reuse any or all of this article please use the link below which will take you to the Copyright Clearance Center’s RightsLink service. You will be able to get a quick price and instant permission to reuse the content in many different ways.

    Data availability statement

    All data relevant to the study are included in the article or uploaded as supplementary information. The Veterans wIth premaTure AtheroscLerosis (VITAL) registry.

    View Full Text

    Footnotes

    • Twitter @dmahtta

    • Correction notice This article has been corrected since it first published. The provenance and peer review statement has been included.

    • Contributors DM: Conception, design and interpretation of data; drafting and revising of manuscript; final approval of the manuscript submitted. DR: Analysis and interpretation of data; final approval of the manuscript submitted. MAlR, CK, NK, ZS, HJ, CB, LAP: Interpretation of data; revising of manuscript; final approval of the manuscript submitted. SSV: Conception, design and interpretation of data; drafting and revising of manuscript; final approval of the manuscript submitted.

    • Funding This work was supported by a Department of Veterans Affairs Health Services Research & Development Service Investigator Initiated Grant (IIR 16–072), an American Heart Association Beginning Grant-in-Aid (14BGIA20460366), the American Diabetes Association Clinical Science and Epidemiology award (1-14- CE-44), and the Houston VA Health Services Research & Development Center for Innovations grant (CIN13-413). Support for VA/CMS data provided by the Department of Veterans Affairs, VA Health Services Research and Development Service, VA Information Resource Center (Project Numbers SDR 02–237 and 98–004).The opinions expressed reflect those of the authors and not necessarily those of the Department of Veterans Affairs or the US government.

    • Competing interests DM, DR, CK, MAlR, ZS, HJ, LAP: None. NK: Serves on the advisory board of Medicines company and Regeneron. CB: Grant/Research Support - all significant (all paid to institution, not individual): Akcea, Amgen, Esperion, Novartis, Regeneron, Sanofi-Synthelabo, NIH, AHA, ADA. Consultant: Abbott Diagnostics, Akcea, Amarin, Amgen, Arrowhead, Astra Zeneca, Corvidia, Denka Seiken, Esperion, Intercept, Matinas BioPharma, Merck, Novartis, Regeneron, Sanofi-Synthelabo. SSV: Honorarium, American College of Cardiology (Associate Editor for Innovations, acc.org); Steering Committee, Patient and Provider Assessment of Lipid Management (PALM registry) at the Duke Clinical Research Institute (no financial remuneration).

    • Provenance and peer review Not commissioned; externally peer reviewed.

    • Supplemental material This content has been supplied by the author(s). It has not been vetted by BMJ Publishing Group Limited (BMJ) and may not have been peer-reviewed. Any opinions or recommendations discussed are solely those of the author(s) and are not endorsed by BMJ. BMJ disclaims all liability and responsibility arising from any reliance placed on the content. Where the content includes any translated material, BMJ does not warrant the accuracy and reliability of the translations (including but not limited to local regulations, clinical guidelines, terminology, drug names and drug dosages), and is not responsible for any error and/or omissions arising from translation and adaptation or otherwise.

    Linked Articles