AD patients exhibit an unfavourable cardiometabolic profile, and greater disease severity may be linked to vascular alterations, supporting the need for cardiovascular assessment in AD management.
Adults with atopic dermatitis had significantly higher BMI compared to healthy controls.
AD patients demonstrated significantly lower Mediterranean diet adherence and reduced physical activity compared to controls.
AD patients had significantly higher mean arterial pressure than healthy controls.
Markers of inflammation and tissue stress were significantly elevated in AD patients compared to controls.
Greater AD disease severity, as measured by vascular-IGA scores, was associated with increased fasting glucose and heart rate.
Estimated 10-year cardiovascular risk was significantly higher in AD patients than in healthy controls.
This research suggests that adults with atopic dermatitis (AD), a chronic inflammatory skin condition, have a worse cardiovascular health profile compared to people without the disease. In a study of 100 adults (half with AD, half healthy controls), people with AD had higher body weight, less adherence to a healthy Mediterranean diet, less physical activity, higher blood pressure, and elevated blood markers of inflammation (CRP and LDH). When researchers used a validated tool called the PREVENT equations to estimate the risk of a heart attack or stroke over the next 10 years, AD patients had a significantly higher estimated risk than controls. The study also found that people with more severe AD had higher fasting blood sugar levels and faster heart rates, suggesting that disease severity may compound cardiovascular risk. These findings add to growing evidence that AD is not just a skin disease but is associated with broader systemic health effects, possibly driven by chronic inflammation that extends beyond the skin. This research suggests that doctors managing AD patients—particularly those with moderate-to-severe disease—may benefit from routinely assessing cardiovascular risk factors as part of overall patient care. Because the study was cross-sectional (a single snapshot in time), it cannot confirm that AD directly causes cardiovascular disease, but it highlights an association that warrants attention in clinical practice and further longitudinal research.
Sanabria-de la Torre R, Oliver-Ramírez A, Abuabara K, Montero-Vílchez T, Arias-Santiago S. (2026). Cardiovascular Risk Factors in Adults with Atopic Dermatitis: A Cross-sectional Study.. Acta dermato-venereologica. https://doi.org/10.2340/actadv.v106.adv-2026-0452