Motoric Cognitive Risk Syndrome and Risk of Cardiovascular Disease: A Population-Based Study

To investigate whether differences between motoric cognitive risk syndrome (MCRS) and mild cognitive impairment (MCI) are of vascular origin, we compared the risk of incident cardiovascular disease in both groups in a population-based study.

We included 2710 dementia-free participants of the Rotterdam Study who underwent structured interviews, as well as gait and cognitive assessments. MCRS was defined as subjective cognitive complaints in combination with slow gait speed. MCI was defined as subjective cognitive complaints and objective impairment in one cognitive domain. We used Cox proportional hazards models adjusted for age, sex, and cardiovascular risk factors to obtain hazard ratios (HR) for the composite outcome of cardiovascular disease, including coronary heart disease and stroke.

Of all 2710 participants (mean age 71 years; 58.5% women), 221 (8.2%) had MCRS and 148 (5.5%) had MCI. During a median follow-up of 7.6 years, 298 individuals suffered a cardiovascular event, including 167 with coronary heart disease and 147 with stroke. Compared to individuals with neither MRCS nor MCI, MCRS was associated with increased risk of cardiovascular disease (HR = 1.54; 95% confidence intervals [95% CI] = 1.03-2.29), but this could not be confirmed for MCI (HR = 0.85; 95% CI = 0.46-1.55). Risk of stroke was similar for individuals with MCRS and MCI, whereas associations with coronary heart disease were observed for MCRS only.

Motoric cognitive risk syndrome, but not MCI, is associated with increased risk of cardiovascular disease, in particular coronary heart disease. These findings are in line with a predominant vascular underpinning of dementia risk attributed to MCRS.