COST Action Blog: VascAgeNet making the arteries visible

World Vascular Ageing Week ran from May 16th to May 20th 2022. It coincided with our in-person Training School and Working Group meeting in Thessaloniki, Greece. The theme of the week was ‘What are you doing for your arteries today?‘ and ran as a social media campaign, asking people to post photos of what they do to keep their heart and arteries healthy.

Each day we focused on different risk factors associated with early vascular ageing and posted videos and information about these topics. Discover a summary of the topics and facts we shared below.

• Smoking both active and passive has been extensively associated with acceleration of vascular ageing both on an acute and a chronic basis.
• The burst of electronic cigarettes and its initial negative repercussion on cardiovascular health through their effect on vascular ageing should also be stressed.
• Alcohol consumption has a J- or U-shaped effect on vascular ageing.
• Low to moderate consumption is beneficial, while high consumption and especially binge drinking may be deleterious on vascular health.

We chose to focus on blood pressure on this this day because it was also ‘World Hypertension Day’.

• Raised blood pressure is the number one cause of preventable death worldwide. Many people with high blood pressure are unaware of their condition.
• Blood Pressure and Vascular Age are interconnected. By maintaining an elastic arterial system, you can prevent high blood pressure.  

• Different dietary components can slow down vascular ageing, by improving endothelial function, controlling vascular tone, oxidative stress, inflammation, platelet function, and reducing blood pressure.
• A healthy destiffening diet, able to reverses the age-related burden of cardiovascular risk, should be rich in fruits and vegetables, polyunsaturated fatty acids, cocoa flavonoids, tea catechins, and dairy products, with a limited intake of salt and red meat.
• Mediterranean diet enables destiffening due to the synergistic effect of its components and reduction in blood pressure.

• Chronic stress (e.g., caregiver stress, financial stress), including exposure to microstressors (e.g. rush-hour traffic, work-related deadlines, social isolation), leads to vascular aging via neuroendocrine-immunologic derangements.
• The practice of yoga asanas seems to inhibit physiologic stress in reducing the stress hormone (salivary cortisol), and improving physiologic and metabolic regulation (e.g., decreasing systolic blood pressure and heart rate, fasting blood glucose, cholesterol and low density lipoprotein); these are beneficial effects that may help prevent or delay vascular aging.
• Long-term sleep pattern misalignment with the 24-hour clock, such as due to insomnia or shift work, can interfere with rhythmic molecular cycling and contribute to vascular aging changes.

• There are clear dose-dependent effects of lifelong (>25 years) exercise training on human arterial stiffness that vary according to the site and size of the arteries.
• 4–5 days/week of committed exercise over a lifetime are necessary to preserve healthy vascular ageing, especially of the large central arteries.
• Casual exercise training of two to three times per week may be sufficient for middle-sized arteries like the carotid to minimize arterial stiffening with ageing

We also know that the vascular ageing process starts from early life, and that it is important to raise awareness from a young age.

For this reason, as part of the awareness week, we introduced a children’s drawing contest.

The awareness week is just one of the ways that we are engaging with the public, we have also created an animation, illustration, and posters that have been translated into 24 languages. Discover them here.

We are also currently working on animation aimed at 8- to 12-year-olds that will be ready in the coming weeks so watch this space.