Key result
Sudden cardiac death accounts for 50% of all cardiovascular deaths, half of which are first cardiac events, highlighting the significant population burden beyond identified high-risk subgroups.
Emphasizes the need for better risk stratification for sudden cardiac death beyond high-risk subgroups, as the general and low-risk populations bear a high proportion of the cumulative burden.
This editorial refers to ‘Electrical risk score beyond the left ventricular ejection fraction: prediction of sudden cardiac death in the Oregon Sudden Unexpected Death Study and the Atherosclerosis Risk in Communities Study’†, by A.L. Aro et al., on page 3017. The challenge before us is clear. Sudden cardiac death (SCD) remains a major public health problem, accounting for 50% of all cardiovascular deaths,1 50% of which are first cardiac events,2 and accounting for 50% of the loss of productivity attributable to cardiovascular diseases.3 While we have had some reasonable successes in population profiling of SCD risk, particularly among the more easily identified high risk subgroups, that segment of the SCD problem accounts for a small component of the population burden. The combination of the general population, those with risk factors without known manifest disease, and the subgroup with disease characterized as low risk accounts for a very high proportion of the cumulative SCD burden.4
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Robert J. Myerburg (2017) conducted an editorial in Sudden cardiac death. Sudden cardiac death accounts for 50% of all cardiovascular deaths, half of which are first cardiac events, highlighting the significant population burden beyond identified high-risk subgroups.
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