Introduction:

In old age, the predictive value of common risk factors is inconsistent. With increasing age, the associations between common risk factors and cardiovascular disease change.

Objective:

To collect information on the common risk factors for cardiovascular disease and their predictive value in the elderly.

Methods:

A review on this subject was carried out at Ramón López Peña community clinic in Santiago de Cuba, from January to May 2022. The search was carried out from Pubmed, Infomed and SciELO databases, with no date restrictions, in Spanish and English.

Results:

The most recent findings suggest that common risk factors for cardiovascular disease might be weaker predictors of future risk in the elderly, while the strength of other factors increases with age. Older people constitute a special subgroup in which other factors such as polypharmacy, orthostatic hypotension, depression, and physical condition have been shown to be potentially important determinants of their cardiovascular risk.

Conclusions:

The predictive value of blood pressure, cholesterol and obesity in the elderly decreases or even reverses, while others such as polypharmacy, frailty and cognitive impairment appear to be promising.

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