Elements of the complete blood count associated with cardiovascular disease incidence: Findings from the EPIC-NL...

Area of Science:

• Hematology
• Cardiovascular Medicine
• Epidemiology

Background:

• Complete blood count (CBC) is a routine clinical test.
• The role of CBC parameters as predictors of cardiovascular disease (CVD) risk is not fully established.
• All blood cell types, including white blood cells (WBC), red blood cells (RBC), and platelets, may influence atherosclerosis.

Purpose of the Study:

• To investigate the association between pre-diagnostic CBC parameters and the incidence of CVD.
• To evaluate the predictive utility of CBC for future CVD events in an adult population without prior CVD.

Main Methods:

• A prospective cohort study involving 14,362 adults initially free of CVD.
• Participants were followed for a median of 11.4 years, during which 992 incident CVD cases occurred.
• Cox proportional hazards regression models were employed to estimate hazard ratios (HRs) and 95% confidence intervals (CIs).

Main Results:

• Elevated total WBC, lymphocyte, monocyte, and neutrophil counts were significantly associated with increased CVD risk (HRs ranging from 1.20 to 1.31).
• Higher mean corpuscular volume (MCV) and red cell distribution width (RDW) were also linked to greater CVD incidence (HRs 1.23 and 1.22, respectively).
• Platelet counts exceeding the normal clinical range showed a notable association with CVD risk (HR 1.49).

Conclusions:

• Total and differential white blood cell counts, MCV, RDW, and platelet count are likely implicated in the pathogenesis of CVD.
• White blood cell counts offer a modest improvement in predicting 10-year CVD risk beyond traditional risk factors in the general population.