Cardiovascular diseases affect many Connecticut adults. An estimated 7.0% of Connecticut adults 18 years or older—or 198,000 adults—have been told by a health professional that they have had a stroke, heart attack, or coronary heart disease.

One complication of cardiovascular diseases is premature death, or death before the age of 75 years.  The rate of premature death from cardiovascular disease has decreased over the years. This decrease may be due to changes in lifestyle, reductions in risk factor prevalence, and improvements in medical care and treatment.

The rates represented on the graph are "years of potential life lost". Years of potential life lost (YPLL) is a measure of premature mortality. YPLL is calculated using the following eight age groups: under 1 year, 1-14 years, 15-24 years, 25-34 years, 35-44 years, 45-54 years, 55-64 years, and 65-74 years. The number of deaths for each age group is multiplied by years of life lost, calculated as the difference between age 75 years and the midpoint of the age group. For the eight age groups, the midpoints are 0.5, 7.5, 19.5, 29.5, 39.5, 49.5, 59.5, and 69.5 years. For example, the death of a person 15-24 years of age counts as 55.5 years of life lost. Years of potential life lost is derived by summing years of life lost over all age groups. The denominator is the population under 75 years of age. YPLL is presented for persons less than 75 years of age because the average life expectance in the United States is over 75 years.

Each data point represents five (5) years of aggregated data. The years listed on the x-axis of the chart represent the end-point of the five years (for example, 2012 includes data from 2008, 2009, 2010, 2011, & 2012).

Rates are age-adjusted to the US 2000 population. Rates are age-adjusted to eliminate differences in crude rates that result from differences in the populations’ age distributions from year to year.

The target was developed as part of Healthy Connecticut 2020 and Live Healthy Connecticut, A Coordinated Chronic Disease Prevention and Health Promotion Plan.

These data are current as of December 2022.  New data will be made available in the Fall of 2023.

For more cardiovascular disease statistics, visit www.ct.gov/dph/heartstrokedata.

Potential Partners:
Connecticut Department of Public Health; Connecticut Department of Agriculture; Connecticut Department of
Social Services; Department of Rehabilitation Services State Unit on Aging; Connecticut Department of Energy and Environmental Protection;
Office of the Healthcare Advocate; local public health agencies; health care providers including community health
centers, hospitals, nurses and physicians; health professional associations; health insurers; pharmaceutical
companies; other businesses and business associations; American Heart Association; other organizations and
coalitions focused on heart disease and stroke; community service providers that serve seniors and other at-risk
populations; philanthropic and research organizations that address heart disease and stroke; schools of public
health, allied health, nursing, and medicine; faith-based organizations; and others.

The Guide to Community Preventive Services Task Force made the following recommendations regarding cardiovascular disease prevention and control:
1. Clinical Decision Support Systems can increase the quality of cardiovascular care. Clinical Decision Support Systems are computer-based information systems designed to assist healthcare providers in implementing clinical guidelines at the point of care.
2. Reduced out-of-pocket costs for patients is associated with improvements in medication adherence, and blood pressure and cholesterol outcomes.
3. Team-based care led to better control of high blood pressure. Team-based care to improve blood pressure control is a health systems-level, organizational intervention that incorporates a multidisciplinary team to improve the quality of hypertension care for patients.

Assist health systems to establish policies for self-blood pressure monitoring in patients with uncontrolled high blood pressure

Identify and support food procurement policy changes to reduce the sodium content in food, with a focus on institutional food purchasers

Work with academic partners and community pharmacies to develop and implement a medication therapy management pilot for at risk patients with high blood pressure and diabetes to promote better control of these chronic illnesses

Collaborate with the Office of Genomics and the American Heart Association to offer a cardiovascular disease genomics symposium for health care professionals to raise awareness concerning the role genetics plays in heart disease

Promote the use of health information technology strategies and population health management tools to improve the quality of preventive care