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A new study finds that many Americans may be carrying around “hearts” much older than their actual age, underscoring hidden risks that could impact millions. Researchers at Northwestern University, led by Dr. Sadiya Khan, have developed an innovative tool that calculates a person’s “heart age” based on well-known cardiovascular risk factors—such as blood pressure, cholesterol, diabetes, and smoking status—rather than just their chronological age.
The tool, built upon the latest American Heart Association PREVENT equations, aims to make the concept of cardiac risk more accessible for both patients and clinicians. “It’s really important that risk is used in how we manage patients in preventive cardiology, but it can be really challenging to interpret the results,” Khan said. Instead of simply stating a percentage risk of a heart attack in 10 years, the “heart age” reframes the message: a 50-year-old with multiple risk factors could have a heart age more like a 65-year-old in optimal health, a finding that can spark action to reduce risk.
Heart risk age models are not new—they’ve been part of European and U.S. guidelines for years. However, this updated tool incorporates current U.S. population risk data and factors in rising public interest in healthy aging. To validate the approach, Khan’s team tested the calculator using data from over 14,000 American adults aged 30-79 years with no prior history of cardiovascular disease. Their findings raise concerns: on average, women had a heart age nearly 4 years older than their real age, while men faced an even bigger gap—on average, about 7 years older.
The disparities are deeply intertwined with socioeconomic factors. Adults with less education and lower income faced significantly older heart ages—in some groups, more than a full decade older than their actual age. Racial and ethnic minorities, especially Black and Hispanic men and women, were also disproportionately affected.
Black men’s heart age averaged 8.5 years older than their chronological age (compared to 6.4 years for White men); for women, the gap was largest for Black women, at 6.2 years older. Dr. Khan emphasized that while these trends were not surprising, they paint a critical picture of the nation’s heart health and the urgent need for targeted prevention.
Public health experts are optimistic that reframing risk as “heart age” could motivate earlier and more effective intervention—especially in younger adults, who tend to ignore cardiac risk due to their low absolute immediate risk. The team also introduced an online tool for calculating heart age, but stress that it should be used as part of a broader doctor-patient discussion: “A tool like this is only as useful as the conversation that follows about opportunities to promote or maintain heart health in optimizing your heart age,” Khan noted.
“This strategy taps into an intuitive grasp of time and aging, a concept more emotionally salient than a probabilistic 10-year risk estimate and may help bridge the persistent gap between knowledge of risk and engagement in health-promoting behavior,” wrote the authors of an editorial accompanying the study.
Disclaimer: This article is based on preliminary research findings and is intended for informational purposes only. The heart age calculator is a tool to assist patient-doctor dialogue; individuals should not rely solely on this tool for cardiovascular health decisions, but consult healthcare professionals for personalized assessment and management.
