Skin autofluorescence assessment of cardiovascular risk in people with severe mental illness

BACKGROUND: People with severe mental illness (SMI) show significantly shorter life expectancy, mostly due to more prevalent cardiovascular disease. Although age is a prominent contributor to contemporary risk assessment and SMI usually affects younger people, these assessments still do not reveal the actual risk. By assessing advanced glycation end products (AGEs), cardiovascular risk can be assessed independent of age. AIMS: To establish whether detection of AGEs with the AGE-reader will give a more accurate cardiovascular risk assessment in people with SMI. METHOD: We compared assessment with the AGE-reader with that of the Systematic Coronary Risk Evaluation (SCORE) table in a group of 120 patients with SMI. RESULTS: The AGE-reader showed an increased cardiovascular risk more often than the SCORE table, especially in the youngest group. CONCLUSIONS: Because of its ease of use and substantiation by studies done on other chronic diseases, we advocate use of the AGE-reader in daily care for patients with SMI to detect cardiovascular risk as early as possible. However, the findings of the current study should be evaluated with caution and should be seen as preliminary findings that require confirmation by a prospective longitudinal cohort study with a substantial follow-up observation period. DECLARATION OF INTEREST: None.