Physical activity and the risk of aortic dissection: results from the UK Biobank
File(s)
Article in press
Author(s)
Sanchez-Perez, Marina
Dillman, Alison
Khan, Momina Yawar
Hibino, Makoto
Aune, Dagfinn
Type
Journal Article
Abstract
Purpose: We investigated the association between physical activity and the risk of aortic dissection in the UK Biobank.
Methods: The analytical dataset included 452,994 participants aged mainly between 40-69 years, recruited from 2006 to 2010. Cox proportional hazards models were used to estimate multivariable-adjusted hazard ratios (HRs) and 95% confidence intervals (CIs) for the association between physical activity and the risk of aortic dissection.
Results: During 12.3 years follow-up, 331 aortic dissection cases were identified. No clear association was observed between the highest vs. lowest quintile of frequency of leisure-time physical activity (HR, 95% CIs: 0.84, 95% CI: 0.59-1.19; ptrend=0.88), moderate physical activity (1.12 (0.77-1.65, ptrend=0.37), or vigorous physical activity (1.11, 0.83-1.50, ptrend=0.51) and risk of aortic dissection. A suggestive inverse U-shaped association was observed for moderate vs. low levels of walking and aortic dissection risk with HRs (95% CIs) of 1.00 (reference), 0.81 (0.54-1.20), 0.65 (0.43-0.99), 0.66 (0.41-1.06) and 0.84 (0.60-1.18) for walking 2, 4, 5, 6, and 7 times/week, respectively. This association was slightly strengthened after exclusion of participants with prevalent CVD, cancer and respiratory disease at baseline. In analyses using MET-hours/week as the metric, a suggestive inverse association was observed for vigorous physical activity (0.66, 0.43-0.99; ptrend=0.09), but not for other physical activity domains.
Conclusion: Overall, we found little evidence of a clear association between physical activity and aortic dissection in the current study. Potential U-shaped inverse associations between frequency of walking and the risk of aortic dissection, and between MET-hours/week of vigorous physical activity and aortic dissection need further study in additional large cohort studies.
Methods: The analytical dataset included 452,994 participants aged mainly between 40-69 years, recruited from 2006 to 2010. Cox proportional hazards models were used to estimate multivariable-adjusted hazard ratios (HRs) and 95% confidence intervals (CIs) for the association between physical activity and the risk of aortic dissection.
Results: During 12.3 years follow-up, 331 aortic dissection cases were identified. No clear association was observed between the highest vs. lowest quintile of frequency of leisure-time physical activity (HR, 95% CIs: 0.84, 95% CI: 0.59-1.19; ptrend=0.88), moderate physical activity (1.12 (0.77-1.65, ptrend=0.37), or vigorous physical activity (1.11, 0.83-1.50, ptrend=0.51) and risk of aortic dissection. A suggestive inverse U-shaped association was observed for moderate vs. low levels of walking and aortic dissection risk with HRs (95% CIs) of 1.00 (reference), 0.81 (0.54-1.20), 0.65 (0.43-0.99), 0.66 (0.41-1.06) and 0.84 (0.60-1.18) for walking 2, 4, 5, 6, and 7 times/week, respectively. This association was slightly strengthened after exclusion of participants with prevalent CVD, cancer and respiratory disease at baseline. In analyses using MET-hours/week as the metric, a suggestive inverse association was observed for vigorous physical activity (0.66, 0.43-0.99; ptrend=0.09), but not for other physical activity domains.
Conclusion: Overall, we found little evidence of a clear association between physical activity and aortic dissection in the current study. Potential U-shaped inverse associations between frequency of walking and the risk of aortic dissection, and between MET-hours/week of vigorous physical activity and aortic dissection need further study in additional large cohort studies.
Date Issued
2026-04-15
Date Acceptance
2026-03-17
Citation
Journal of Science in Sport and Exercise, 2026
ISSN
2096-6709
Publisher
Springer
Journal / Book Title
Journal of Science in Sport and Exercise
Copyright Statement
© The Author(s). Open Access This article is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License, which permits any non-commercial use, sharing, distribution and reproduction in any medium or format, as long as you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons licence, and indicate if you modified the licensed material. You do not have permission under this licence to share adapted material derived from this article or parts of it. The images or other third party material in this article are included in the article’s Creative Commons licence, unless indicated otherwise in a credit line to the material. If material is not included in the article’s Creative Commons licence and your intended use is not permitted by statutory regulation or exceeds the permitted use, you will need to obtain permission directly from the copyright holder. To view a copy of this licence, visit http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/.
Identifier
10.1007/s42978-026-00380-0
Subjects
Physical activity
Walking
Moderate activity
Vigorous activity
Aortic dissection
Cohort
UK Biobank
Publication Status
Published online
Date Publish Online
2026-04-15