Trajectories of physical health-related quality of life and the risk of incident cardiovascular disease events and all-cause mortality in older people.

Study Objective: The aim of this study was to identify whether physical component score (PCS) of health-related quality of life trajectories over 4.7-years predicted subsequent risk of incident fatal and non-fatal CVD events, and all-cause mortality.

Methods: This study included 16,871 community-dwelling people aged ≥65 years enrolled in the ASPREE (ASPirin in Reducing Events in the Elderly) trial. PCS was assessed annually using the SF-12 (version-2) over a median 4.7-years (i.e. from baseline (2010-2014) till June 2017). Incident CVD events and all-cause mortality occurring after June 2017 until the second-year after the end of the trial were considered. Growth mixture and logistic regression modelling were used.

Results: Four PCS trajectories were identified: high (66.5%), intermediate (13.3%), decline (13.8%), and low (6.5%), and there was subsequently a total of 406 (2.50%) incident CVD events, 197 (1.17%) fatal CVD, and 751 (4.45%) deaths. The declining PCS trajectory group had the highest risk of incident CVD (adjusted OR, 1.51; 95% CI 1.14, 1.99), while the low PCS trajectory group had the greatest risk of fatal CVD (adjusted OR, 1.74; 95%CI 1.06, 2.85) and all-cause mortality (adjusted OR, 1.83; 95%CI 1.40, 2.40). After further adjustment for the baseline PCS score, only the association between declining PCS trajectory and incident CVD (adjusted OR, 1.51; 95%CI 1.11, 2.07) remained.

Conclusion: Our study strengthens the importance of PCS as a predictive measure of CVD and all-cause mortality in older people and also highlights that a declining PCS trajectory could be considered an early predictor of future CVD events.