MyoFit46 is a comprehensive prospective observational study of ‘myocardial fitness’ in older age led by Dr Gaby Captur and funded by the British Heart Foundation SP/20/2/34841.
Over 5-years (2020 till 2025) it is recruiting 500 participants from within the 1946 British Birth Cohort to attend for a clinic visit in London that involves integrated stress perfusion and 4D flow CMR with electrocardiographic imaging.
The MyoFit46 study is now closed to recruitment having scanned the last study member on 15th March 2024 (this is more than 1 year ahead of our funding deadline which is July 2025).
Background: The life course accumulation of overt and subclinical myocardial dysfunction contributes to older age mortality, frailty, disability and loss of independence. The Medical Research Council National Survey of Health and Development (NSHD) is the world’s longest running continued surveillance birth cohort providing a unique opportunity to understand life course determinants of myocardial dysfunction as part of MyoFit46-the cardiac sub-study of the NSHD.
Methods: Funded by the British Heart Foundation in 2020, the MyoFit46 led by principal investigator Dr Gaby Captur will recruit 500 NSHD participants of approximately 75 years+ to undertake high-density surface electrocardiographic imaging (ECGI) and stress perfusion cardiovascular magnetic resonance (CMR). Through comprehensive myocardial tissue characterization and 4-dimensional flow we hope to better understand the burden of clinical and subclinical cardiovascular disease. Supercomputers will be used to combine the multi-scale ECGI and CMR datasets per participant. Rarely available, prospectively collected whole-of-life data on exposures, traditional risk factors and multimorbidity will be studied to identify risk trajectories, critical change periods, mediators and cumulative impacts on the myocardium.
Discussion: By combining well curated, prospectively acquired longitudinal data of the NSHD with novel CMR-ECGI data and sharing these results and associated pipelines with the CMR community, MyoFit46 seeks to transform our understanding of how early, mid and later-life risk factor trajectories interact to determine the state of cardiovascular health in older age.
Trial registration: Prospectively registered on ClinicalTrials.gov with trial ID: 19/LO/1774 Multimorbidity Life-Course Approach to Myocardial Health- A Cardiac Sub-Study of the MCRC National Survey of Health and Development (NSHD).