Social Drivers of Health Tied to Biological Heart Aging

FRIDAY, Jan. 2, 2026 (HealthDay News) — Financial strain and food insecurity are drivers of accelerated biological heart aging, according to a study published in the December issue of the Mayo Clinical Proceedings.

Nazanin Rajai, M.D., from the Mayo Clinic in Rochester, Minnesota, and colleagues created a model to predict cardiac aging and mortality and examined the interconnection between psychosocial and conventional risk determinants. Analysis included 280,323 patients.

The researchers found that financial strain (β = −1.02) and food insecurity (β = −0.74) were the strongest social determinants. Social determinants of health had the highest contribution to predict age gap in the total population (β = −0.197) and sex-stratified analysis, compared with comorbidities and demographic factors. There was a strong association between social determinant of health domains and mortality, particularly financial resource strain (hazard ratio, 1.6), when adjusting for conventional risk factors.

“The study highlights the contribution of social determinants of health with interaction to comorbidities and demographic risk factors in cardiac aging and mortality,” the authors write. “Identifying the most important determinants enables targeted preventive intervention in the community and enables physicians to engage in patient-centered care.”

Abstract/Full Text