“The number of people with early strokes is on the rise. These people are more likely to die from life-threatening events, and survivors can face decades of disability. Despite this, there is very little research into the causes of early strokes,” said the study’s co-authors. said lead investigator Dr. Steven J. Kittner. He is a professor of neurology at the University of Maryland School of Medicine and a neurologist at the University of Maryland Medical Center.
Compared with people with other blood types, blood type A had a 16% higher risk of early stroke, and blood type O had a 12% lower risk of stroke.
Kittner and his colleagues conducted the study by conducting a meta-analysis of 48 studies on genetics and ischemic stroke, including 17,000 stroke patients and nearly 600,000 healthy controls who had never experienced a stroke. They then scrutinized all the collected chromosomes to identify genetic variants associated with stroke. They found a link between early-onset stroke — which occurs before the age of 60 — and a chromosomal region that includes the genes that determine whether blood type is A, AB, B or O.
According to the study, people with an early stroke were more likely to have type A blood and less likely to have type O (the most common blood type) compared to people with advanced stroke and people who never had a stroke. Early and late stroke patients were also more likely to have blood type B compared to the control group. After adjusting for gender and other factors, the investigators found that people with type A blood had a 16 percent higher risk of early stroke than people with other blood types. People with type O blood have a 12% lower risk of stroke than people with other blood types.
“Our meta-analysis looked at people’s genetic profiles and found an association between blood type and risk of early-onset stroke. The association between blood type and late stroke was much weaker than what we found for early stroke,” said the study’s co-principal investigators. , said Dr. Braxton D. Mitchell, UMSOM Professor of Medicine.
The scientists stress that the increased risk is very modest. Those with type A blood should not worry about having an early-onset stroke, nor should they undergo additional screening or medical testing based on the finding, they said.
Dr Kittner said: “We still don’t know why blood type A is associated with a higher risk, but it may be related to clotting factors such as platelets and cells lining blood vessels, as well as other circulating proteins, all of which are involved in the development of blood clots. It works. Previous studies have shown that people with blood type A have a slightly higher risk of developing blood clots in the legs, called deep vein thrombosis.” He added: “We clearly need more follow-up studies to clarify the increased risk of stroke. Mechanisms.”
One limitation of the study was the relative lack of diversity among the participants. The data came from the Early Onset Stroke Coalition, which consists of 48 different studies in North America, Europe, Japan, Pakistan and Australia. About 35% of the participants were of non-European ancestry.
“This study raises an important question that warrants a more in-depth investigation of how our genetically predetermined blood types play a role in early stroke risk,” said Mark T. Gladwin, executive vice president of medical affairs at the University of Baltimore. “It points to the urgent need to find new ways to prevent these potentially devastating events in young adults.”