Increasing Accumulations of Coronary Artery Calcium Linked with Heart Attacks and Death.

Individuals with 300 units or more in accumulations of coronary artery calcium over a 2.5 year follow-up were more than six times as likely to suffer from a heart attack or die from heart disease than individuals who didn't have increasing accumulations in a recent Journal of the American College of Cardiology study of 6778 people aged 45 to 84 years. Nearly half (49.9%) of the participants had coronary artery calcium in their initial scans, and most of them (84.8%) continued to accumulate coronary artery calcium, as measured in subsequent CT scans during follow-up.