AUTHOR=Vadini Francesco , Lanzara Roberta , Iuliani Ornella , Affaitati Gianna Pia , Porcelli Piero 

TITLE=Alexithymia and estimated 10-year cardiovascular disease risk in healthy adults: a community-based cross-sectional study

JOURNAL=Frontiers in Psychology

VOLUME=15

YEAR=2024

URL=https://www.frontiersin.org/journals/psychology/articles/10.3389/fpsyg.2024.1504143

DOI=10.3389/fpsyg.2024.1504143

ISSN=1664-1078

ABSTRACT=<sec id="sec1"><title>Background</title><p>This cohort study aimed to explore whether and to what extent alexithymia would be associated with cardiovascular disease (CVD) risk over an estimated 10-year period, over and above established clinical cofactors (i.e., depressive symptoms, quality of life, sociodemographic, anthropometric, lifestyle, and biological data), in a low-risk population of blood donors.</p></sec><sec id="sec2"><title>Methods</title><p>A sample of 1,021 adult Italian blood donors (age 46.9 ± 8.39; 61.2% men) was consecutively recruited. The 10-year-CVD risk score was estimated using the CUORE risk score (CRS). Sociodemographic, lifestyle, anthropometric, biological, and psychological (i.e., quality of life, depressive symptoms, and alexithymia) CVD risk data were assessed using validated self-report measures or clinical records.</p></sec><sec id="sec3"><title>Results</title><p>As expected, most participants (78.5%) had a low CVD risk (CRS &lt; 3%) and an overall low-risk profile for all the parameters. Compared with subjects at low risk of CVD (<italic>n</italic> = 911, 78.5%), those with high risk (i.e., rated ≥3 on CUORE risk assessment; <italic>n</italic> = 250, 21.5%) reported higher levels of alexithymia (<italic>p</italic> &lt; 0.001). Subjects with higher alexithymia (<italic>n</italic> = 236, 23.1%) reported higher levels of psychosocial impairment, depressive symptoms, and biological risk variables for CVD. Alexithymia was significantly associated with 10-year CVD risk (OR = 1.02, 95% CI = 1.01–1.04, <italic>p</italic> = 0.009), even after adjusting for key sociodemographic and clinical risk variables.</p></sec><sec id="sec4"><title>Conclusion</title><p>Although limited by the cross-sectional design, this study is the first to show that alexithymia leads to a higher risk for 10-year CVD estimate in healthy subjects with low-risk profile, regardless of known biomarkers and traditional CVD risk factors.</p></sec>