Cardiovascular disease among people with drug use disorders

To present the prevalence and incidence of cardiovascular disease (CVD) in a national cohort of patients seeking treatment for drug use disorders (DUD).

This is a longitudinal record linkage study of consecutive DUD treatment admissions between 2000 and 2006 from Denmark.

Of 17,642 patients seeking treatment for DUD, 828 individuals (4.53%) had a history of CVD at treatment entry. Among the remaining patients, 16,820 were traced and 1535 new incident cases of CVD were observed during a mean follow-up time of 7.5 years. The incidence of CVD was associated with intravenous drug use [subhazard ratio (SHR) = 1.41, p < 0.001], not responding to injection question (SHR = 1.23, p = 0.005), older age (SHR = 1.04 per year, p = 0.000), use of prescription methadone (SHR = 1.32, p < 0.001), use of benzodiazepines (SHR = 1.21, p = 0.005), and being referred to methadone treatment (SHR = 1.15, p = 0.022). The use of amphetamines was negatively associated with the risk of CVD within this cohort (SHR = 0.75, p = 0.001).

Patients injecting drugs using prescribed methadone were at elevated risk for cardiovascular disease and should be monitored for CVD. Opioid medications should be evaluated in terms of their cardiovascular sequelae.