Mothers’ Lifestyles Provide Pointers to Likely Onset of Stroke or Heart Attacks in Offspring

In a study published in the “European Journal of Preventive Cardiology,” research findings show that children from mothers who had healthy lifestyles lived almost 10 years longer without cardiovascular diseases as compared to kids with mothers with unhealthy lifestyles.

Dr. James Muchira, the study’s author from Vanderbilt University, says that the study proposes that mothers are the main guardians of their offspring’s health.

Prior research shows that parents pass on health to their children through shared lifestyle or environment and genes. This pioneer study by Muchira is the first that looks into whether a parent’s heart health is linked to the age at which children develop cardiovascular disease. The study examined the influence of each parent individually.

The study was based on a child-mother-father trio model and involved a total of 5,967 people, with the number of fathers, mothers and offspring numbering 1,989 each. The children who were enrolled in the study in their early 30s were observed over a 46-year period (1971–2017) into their adult lives when strokes and heart attacks occur.

The researchers rated the cardiovascular health of fathers and mothers according to the following factors: blood glucose, blood cholesterol, blood pressure, healthy diet, physically active lifestyle, body mass index and smoking habits. Cardiovascular health was grouped into three categories: ideal (five to seven factors achieved), intermediate (three to four factors achieved) and poor (two or under). The researchers then evaluated any links between how long children lived without cardiovascular disease and parental cardiovascular health. They assessed the association between each pair, i.e., father-son, father-daughter, mother-son and mother-daughter.

While their results show that the father’s heart health had no significant effect on the period of time a child lived without cardiovascular disease, data did show that the risk of offspring suffering from early onset cardiovascular disease was twice as high if a mother had poor cardiovascular health.

Muchira explained that this strong maternal contribution was possibly a combination of environment and health status during pregnancy and into early life. He noted, however, that sons were more affected by a poor maternal health lifestyle than daughters. This, he noted, was mainly because sons had more detrimental lifestyles, which only made the situation worse. He added that people who inherited a high risk from their mothers could decrease that risk by eating well and exercising.

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