Why Healthy People Have Heart Attacks

In 2017, world famous fitness trainer and health advocate Bob Harper suffered a heart attack.[i] When someone as healthy as Harper, who made his career training and transforming the lives of overweight and obese people on The Biggest Loser, suffers from cardiovascular disease (CVD), it’s a wakeup call telling you that no matter how healthy you are, you can still fall victim to the deadly silent killer.

Bob Harper’s Instagram Post

In subsequent interviews, Harper said he never even considered that he could have a heart attack due to his extremely healthy lifestyle.[ii] He never underwent screening for CVD risk factors, nor consulted a doctor on whether he should. However, it appears that the warning signs were there.

Harper’s mother and maternal grandfather had both died from heart attacks around age 70. His family history is a serious risk factor for CVD, and had he done recent blood tests, he would have found that he had a cholesterol abnormality—high lipoprotein(a)—which he likely inherited from his mother and made him extremely prone to heart disease. He suffered one of the most serious types of heart attacks, where the left anterior descending artery, one of the three main arteries supplying blood to the heart, was almost totally blocked. He went into cardiac arrest while working out at his gym and was in a coma for two days. It was a miracle he survived.

Harper is not the only “healthy” person to have suffered a heart attack. In 1984, running guru James Fixx, who wrote several books on running marathons, died of a heart attack while running at age 52. Fixx too had a genetic disposition for heart disease—his father had died from his second heart attack at age 43, and Fixx himself had a congenitally enlarged heart.[iii]

Unfortunately, sometimes being healthy is not enough to protect you from CVD. In fact, while heart disease is often thought of mostly affecting older people, ages 65 and above, today more younger people are suffering heart attacks and other forms of CVD. A 2019 study showed that 20% of heart attack patients are under 40 years old and that number has increased by 2% annually since 2000.[iv] Younger people who experience CVD have the same risks as the elderly for experiencing repeat episodes and further health complications.

The invisible risks

While CVD can seem like it comes out of nowhere, it doesn’t strike at random. Even the healthiest people could show signs of CVD if they were looking close enough.

For example, a recent study showed that more than 40% of middle-aged adults with no heart disease exhibited signs of atherosclerosis, which is a buildup of fatty deposits that reduces blood flow to the heart.[v] Atherosclerosis is generally detected through a cardiac CT, however this testing method often fails to detect atherosclerosis in people who have no symptoms of clogged arteries. Atherosclerosis can be a serious condition if it significantly blocks blood flow to the heart and can lead to other more serious forms of CVD.

Another invisible risk is a “silent” heart attack. A silent heart attack, also known as a silent myocardial infarction, is exactly what it sounds like: a heart attack with no recognizable symptoms. It can only be diagnosed with an electrocardiogram or via magnetic resonance imaging.[vi] Sufferers of silent heart attacks may have no idea what they are experiencing. They could have no symptoms at all or feel minor discomfort that wouldn’t alert them to an episode of CVD. However, they would be at a higher risk of experiencing subsequent episodes of CVD including heart attacks and strokes.

The importance of genetics

No matter how healthy a person is, they cannot escape their genetics. Many cardiac disorders are inherited, including arrhythmias, congenital heart disease, cardiomyopathy, and even high blood cholesterol.

One of the most common genetic factors that leads to heart disease is familial hypercholesterolemia. This is a genetic disorder that people are born with that makes the body unable to remove low-density lipoprotein (LDL) cholesterol from the blood. This leads to high cholesterol and early age heart attacks. If left untreated, women have a 30% chance of experiencing a heart attack by age 60 and men have a 50% chance of experiencing a heart attack by age 50.

Image source: Centers for Disease Control and Prevention

Protect yourself from CVD

Even if you maintain a healthy diet, exercise, and live a heart-healthy lifestyle, some risk factors of CVD are unavoidable. The best thing you can do to protect yourself is to get regular heart screenings. Screenings can gauge your heart health, determine your risks, and help you make any decisions you need to further protect your heart. Adults ages 18-80 should be screened regularly. If you have a family history of CVD or any other risk factors, you should get screened annually. Screening from an early age is the best preventative measure against serious and even fatal CVD.

MyCardioGuard provides screenings that detect early-stage CVD in individuals with few or no symptoms. Our FDA-approved and patented technology is based on years of clinical experience and medical research, making it more predictive than traditional heart screening methods. If you’re interested in a 15-minute, non-invasive screening that could save your life, check out our website: https://www.mycardioguard.com/


[i] https://www.instagram.com/p/BRCDShMhNrF/

[ii] Colino, B. S. (2018, February 26). “Biggest Loser” Host on His Heart Attack and Recovery. AARP. https://www.aarp.org/health/healthy-living/info-2018/bob-harper-heart-attack-fd.html

[iii] Wikipedia contributors. (2022, June 3). Jim Fixx. Wikipedia. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jim_Fixx

[iv] Lavidor, E. (2021, March 2). Why Are Heart Attacks Striking Younger People? Brigham Health Hub. https://brighamhealthhub.org/why-are-heart-attacks-striking-younger-people/

[v] More than 40% of adults with no known heart disease had fatty deposits in heart arteries. (2021, September 20). American Heart Association. https://newsroom.heart.org/news/more-than-40-of-adults-with-no-known-heart-disease-had-fatty-deposits-in-heart-arteries

[vi] “Silent” heart attacks may increase risk of stroke. (2021, March 11). American Heart Association. https://newsroom.heart.org/news/silent-heart-attacks-may-increase-risk-of-stroke

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *