A Norwegian populations study recently conducted showed that higher resting heart rates over a 10-year span correlated with an increased risk of heart-related deaths.
More than 46,000 participants had their resting heart rates recorded in the first two phases of the study. Researchers excluded 11,268 participants, who had a history of heart disease in their families and 5,800 who didn't return the questionnaire about physical activity.
"The nonlinear association of resting heart rate with ischemic heart disease mortality, and our subgroup finding, suggest that certain groups of individuals may benefit from a decrease in resting heart rate, whereas for others, the opposite may be true," the authors wrote, also adding that the finding needs further investigation.
Researchers found that, overall, rises in temporal resting heart rates were associated with a great risk of death from cardiovascular diseases.
During the study, 3,038 of the participants died. Of these 975 died from cardiovascular disease and 388 died from ischemic heart disease.
With more than 1.5 million heart attacks occurring in the United States every year, causing about 500,000 deaths, Americans should both investigate ways to lower their risk of cardiovascular disease and secure some form of life insurance to prepare for the future.