Feeling Constipated? You May Have a Higher Risk for Heart Disease

Rockville, Md. (Oct. 29, 2024)—People with constipation may have a higher risk of having a heart attack or stroke, and the risk increases in people who also have high blood pressure. The findings of a new study are published in the American Journal of Physiology-Heart and Circulatory Physiology.  The study has been chosen as an APSselect article for October.

High blood pressure, diabetes, obesity, smoking and age are a few of the traditional risk factors for cardiovascular disease. A recent study of the connections between the heart and gut revealed that constipation—a condition that also increases with age—is associated with high blood pressure and cardiovascular disease. This heart and gut connection was independent of these traditional risk factors or medication used to treat high blood pressure such as calcium channel blockers.

In this study, the research team used data from over 400,000 people in the U.K. Biobank to determine if constipation could be an independent, nontraditional risk factor for cardiovascular disease. This database contains electronic medical records, lifestyle surveys, and self-reported health conditions and medication use data. Because the biobank contained limited information from nonwhite populations at the time of data collection, the current study is based on data from males and females of white European ancestry.

The researchers found 11.5% of people analyzed had experienced at least one major adverse cardiac event, with much higher rates in men (67.3% of all cases who had a cardiovascular event). Constipation rates overall were higher in women (55.9% of all cases).

More than 157,400 of the participants had high blood pressure and 8.6% of them were also diagnosed with constipation. Those with constipation “demonstrated a significantly increased risk of [major adverse cardiac events] compared with those with regular bowel habits,” the researchers wrote. This increased risk was adjusted for the use of constipating medications.

In addition, the researchers found genetic correlations in more than 9 million instances of genetic variations between constipation and major cardiac events, showing constipation shares 21% to 27% of genetic variants with cardiovascular disease. Genome analysis estimated constipation to be a heritable trait about 4% of the time.

Identifying the associations between constipation and heart disease can help scientists “discover new therapeutic interventions and implement more effective management strategies based on individual risk assessment in line with precision medicine principles,” the researchers wrote.

Read the full article, “Constipation Is Associated with an Increased Risk of Major Adverse Cardiac Events in a U.K. Population.” It is highlighted as one of this month’s “best of the best” as part of the American Physiological Society’s APSselect program. Read this month’s selected research articles.  

NOTE TO JOURNALISTS: To schedule an interview with a member of the research team, please contact APS Media Relations or call 301.634.7314. Find more research highlights in our Newsroom.  

Physiology is a broad area of scientific inquiry that focuses on how molecules, cells, tissues and organs function in health and disease. The American Physiological Society connects a global, multidisciplinary community of more than 10,000 biomedical scientists and educators as part of its mission to advance scientific discovery, understand life and improve health. The Society drives collaboration and spotlights scientific discoveries through its 16 scholarly journals and programming that support researchers and educators in their work.