“Cardiovascular disease (CVD) such as heart attack and stroke are a major cause of death and disability worldwide. Finding new strategies for CVD prevention is a crucial goal for global health policy.
Two recent advances have changed how we view CVD. The first is that chronic low-grade inflammation is a key factor in CVD development. The second is that CVD development is a lifelong process; damage to the arteries (atherosclerosis, or ‘hardening of the arteries’) may start in early life, progress silently for decades, and eventually become irreversible, leading to CVD events in adulthood.
Improved understanding of CVD development across the life span will identify of novel risk factors that could be addressed with early, effective prevention.
Rutger will explore how infection burden, inflammation, and early pre-clinical measures of cardiovascular health are related in pre-school children. He will conduct this research at the Murdoch Children’s Research Institute in Melbourne, Australia, the leading paediatric research institute in Southern Hemisphere and ranked 3rd globally.”
