Losing a sibling may break your heart

Embargoed until: Publicly released: 2024-01-09 10:30

International

CC:0

Looking at over two million people born in Denmark, Chinese researchers have found a link between having a sibling die and developing heart disease early in your life. Losing a sibling during childhood and early adulthood was associated with a 17% increased risk of heart disease, with a majority of that being early-onset. This kind of study cannot directly prove that the loss of a sibling will cause you heart issues, but does point to the need for extra support for the surviving family, the researchers add.

Journal/
conference: JAMA Network Open

Research:Paper

Organisation/s: Fudan University, Shanghai, China

Funder: This work was supported by grants 82273730 to Dr Yu and 82173612 to Dr Qin from the National Natural Science Foundation of China; grant 21QA1401300 to Dr Yu from the Shanghai Rising-Star Program; grant 22ZR1414900 to Dr Yu from the Shanghai Municipal Natural Science Foundation; grant ZD2021CY001 to Dr Qin from the Shanghai Municipal Science and Technology Major Project; grants DFF-6110- 00019B, 9039-00010B, and 1030-00012B to Dr Li from the Independent Research Fund Denmark; grants R275- A15770, R278-A15877, and R279-A15931 to Dr Li from the Nordic Cancer Union; grant 2016 to Dr Li from the Karen Elise Jensens Fond; and grant NNF18OC0052029 to Dr Li from the Novo Nordisk Fonden.

Media Contact/s

Contact details are only visible to registered journalists.