Research Highlights:
- Adults who reported feeling lonely or that they can't confide in someone close to them had a higher risk of developing degenerative heart valve disease, even after considering traditional heart disease risk factors and genetics.
- Unhealthy lifestyle habits, such as smoking, excessive alcohol and inactivity, played a major role in linking loneliness to degenerative heart valve disease.
- However, social isolation, defined as living alone, having little social contact with friends or family in a month and not participating in social or leisure activities, was not associated with increased degenerative heart valve disease risk.
- Loneliness may be an independent and potentially modifiable risk factor that may help reduce the risk of degenerative valvular heart disease.
Embargoed until 4 a.m. CT/5 a.m. ET Wednesday, April 15, 2026
DALLAS, April 15, 2026 — Adults who reported feeling lonely had a higher risk of developing degenerative heart valve disease , even after accounting for traditional heart disease risk factors and genetics, according to new research published today in the Journal of the American Heart Association , an open-access, peer-reviewed journal of the American Heart Association.
Valvular heart disease occurs when one of the heart's four valves stops functioning properly. According to the American Heart Association's 2026 Heart Disease and Stroke Statistics Report , valvular heart disease accounted for more than 440,000 deaths in the U.S. between 1999 and 2020, which is roughly the population of Oakland, California. Valvular heart disease represented 2.38% of total cardiovascular deaths in 1999-2000. Birth defects, as well as aging-related degeneration or other conditions, can cause heart valve problems. Degenerative valvular heart disease occurs when the heart valves gradually become stiff or leaky over time, making it harder for blood to flow properly through the heart.
A 2022 scientific statement from the American Heart Association about the impact of objective and perceived social isolation on heart and brain health noted that a lack of social connection is associated with an increased risk of premature death from all causes, as well as other adverse health outcomes.
Researchers say this is one of the first large-scale studies to comprehensively examine the relationships between loneliness, a lack of connection or engagement with others, and the risk of degenerative valvular heart disease.
"Degenerative valvular heart disease is becoming more common as populations age," said study author Zhaowei Zhu, M.D., Ph.D., an associate professor of cardiovascular medicine at The Second Xiangya Hospital, Central South University in Changsha, Hunan, China. "Our findings suggest that loneliness may be an independent and potentially modifiable risk factor for degenerative valvular heart disease.
"Identifying this new risk is an important step in potentially preventing valve disease, which can lead to heart failure, reduced quality of life and the need for valve replacement surgery," Zhu said. "Heart valve disease diagnosed in people who reported 'feeling lonely' may reflect a biological vulnerability related to an individual's feelings and emotional well-being, and also a growing societal burden."
In this study, researchers reviewed existing information from about 463,000 adults enrolled in the UK Biobank. Participants completed questionnaires to assess loneliness and social isolation when they enrolled. Researchers followed participants for a median of nearly 14 years, using medical records to track new diagnoses of degenerative valvular heart disease.
Results of the analysis:
- More than 11,000 new cases of degenerative valvular heart disease were diagnosed during the follow-up.
- Among those, more than 4,200 cases were aortic valve stenosis , a condition in which the valve that allows blood to leave the heart becomes narrowed and restricts blood flow; and nearly 4,700 were mitral valve regurgitation , a condition in which the valve between the heart's left chambers does not close properly, allowing blood to leak backward.
- About 72% of participants reported minimal loneliness, while 28% reported higher levels of loneliness.
- Compared with people who reported minimal loneliness, those with the highest level of loneliness had a 19% higher risk of developing degenerative valvular heart disease; a 21% higher risk of aortic valve stenosis; and a 23% higher risk of mitral valve regurgitation.
- In contrast, social isolation was not significantly associated with increased risk for any valvular heart disease conditions.
- Loneliness appeared to increase the risk regardless of a person's genetic background. However, people who had both high genetic risk for heart valve disease and high loneliness scores had the highest risk of valvular heart disease diagnosis.
- Unhealthy lifestyle behaviors (such as obesity, smoking, excess alcohol drinking, suboptimal sleep duration or irregular physical activity) partially explained the relationship between loneliness and valvular heart disease.
"Our results suggest that addressing loneliness could help delay disease progression, postpone surgical interventions such as valve replacement, and ultimately reduce the long-term clinical and economic burden of valvular heart disease," said study co-author Cheng Wei, M.D, a Ph.D. candidate in cardiovascular medicine at The Second Xiangya Hospital.
"These findings should highlight for patients and health care professionals that loneliness is not just an emotion; not something a person must get over or deal with on their own," said American Heart Association volunteer expert Crystal Wiley Cené, M.D., M.P.H., FAHA, who led the writing group on perceived isolation and cardiovascular disease, and who was not involved in this study. "Loneliness, particularly chronic loneliness, is a stressor for the body that can damage people's health. Patients and health care professionals need to understand the importance of talking about loneliness and social disconnectedness as a health risk, not a moral failing or sign of weakness."
"The aging process can cause degeneration of heart values, and the risk of social isolation and loneliness also increase with age, so it is not inconceivable that loneliness is associated with heart valve disease," said Cené, who is also a professor of medicine and public health at University of California, San Diego and chair elect of the Association's Implementation Science Committee for the Council on Epidemiology and Prevention.
She also noted that loneliness is about the quality of relationships, not quantity. "You can be lonely even when you are surrounded by others, if those connections aren't fulfilling or meaningful," Cené said. "Loneliness represents a mismatch between the connections a person desires and what they have. This explains why our youngest generations are the most connected generations with lots of online 'friends,' yet also may be the loneliest. Connections that exist online only may not be the most fulfilling."
Both Wei and Cené encourage people to discuss how they feel with health care professionals, and health care professionals should encourage patients to engage in meaningful forms of social connection.
Study limitations include that it was observational, meaning the research cannot prove that loneliness directly caused valvular heart disease; rather, the findings showed an association between the two. Another limitation is that loneliness was measured using self-reported questionnaires completed at a single point in time, which does not capture changes over time. In addition, most participants of the UK Biobank are white adults, which may limit how broadly the results apply to people in other racial or ethnic groups.
"Future studies are needed to confirm these findings in more diverse populations, understand the biological mechanisms linking loneliness and valve degeneration, and test whether interventions that reduce loneliness can lower the risk of valvular heart disease," Wei said.
Study details, background and design:
- Data for 462,917 adults participating in the UK Biobank were included in this study. Participants' median age was 58 years; 45% were men, 55% were women; and 95% were white adults.
- All participants were free of valvular heart disease when they enrolled in the UK Biobank, and they were followed for a median of 13.9 years.
- Loneliness was assessed by asking if respondents often felt lonely and how often they were able to confide in others. Questions about social isolation focused on the frequency of physical interactions. Researchers separated high-risk loneliness as feeling lonely and never confiding in others, vs. high-risk social isolation, which was defined as living alone, having less than once-a-month contact with family or friends, and not participating in any social or leisure activities.
- Participants with higher loneliness scores tended to be male and to have lower educational attainment. They also exhibited less favorable lifestyle profiles, including high rates of current smoking, physical inactivity, unhealthy sleep patterns and low dietary scores.
- Medical records were tracked for reported incidence of valvular heart disease.
- Genetic information and family history were obtained from blood samples, and participants completed the loneliness questionnaire during their first visit to a UK Biobank assessment center.
Co-authors, disclosures and funding sources are listed in the manuscript.
