How Your Score Is Calculated
HeartGuard's score combines points from 16 lifestyle and health questions, loosely inspired by established risk frameworks such as the Framingham Risk Score and the American College of Cardiology/American Heart Association's ASCVD (Atherosclerotic Cardiovascular Disease) Risk Estimator, adapted here for accessibility and educational use.
Why We Ask Each Question
Age, BMI, blood pressure, cholesterol, smoking, diabetes status, diet, physical activity, and family history are all established contributors to cardiovascular risk in medical literature. Each question maps to a specific, evidence-based risk factor: for example, blood pressure and cholesterol both directly affect how hard the heart has to work and how much plaque builds up in the arteries, while diet and physical activity influence those same numbers indirectly over time. The point values in the table below were set by ranking each answer option from lowest to highest associated risk within its own category (for example, "never smoked" scores lower than "smokes daily"), then scaling that ranking so no single factor can outweigh the others by more than a few points — the goal is a balanced snapshot across many factors, not a precise clinical calculation.
How Points Are Assigned
Each answer is assigned a point value (0 to 5) based on how strongly that factor is associated with cardiovascular risk. For example, daily smoking scores higher than occasional smoking; a longstanding Type 2 diabetes diagnosis scores higher than prediabetes.
Risk Categories
Total scores range from 0–51 and are grouped into four bands:
| Band | Score Range | Share of Total Range |
|---|---|---|
| Low | 0–12 | ~25% |
| Mild | 13–24 | ~24% |
| Moderate | 25–38 | ~27% |
| High | 39–51 | ~25% |
These bands divide the 0–51 point scale into four roughly equal segments. They are simplified cutoffs for educational clarity, not clinically validated diagnostic boundaries.
About Framingham & ASCVD (Atherosclerotic Cardiovascular Disease) Risk Estimator
The Framingham Risk Score comes from the Framingham Heart Study, a population study that has followed the residents of Framingham, Massachusetts across multiple generations since 1948 — one of the longest-running cardiovascular studies in the world. The ASCVD Risk Estimator was developed by the American College of Cardiology and American Heart Association and is built into official clinical guidelines used by doctors across the United States today. Both are among the most widely used and clinically validated cardiovascular risk tools in medicine, and both remain in active use in clinical practice decades after their introduction.
HeartGuard does not use either tool's original formula. Instead, we borrowed their general structure — combining age, blood pressure, cholesterol, smoking, and diabetes status into a single score — because that structure is well established and easy to explain, and adapted the math into a simpler point system that doesn't require lab values most people don't have on hand (like an exact cholesterol reading). This makes HeartGuard more accessible, but also means it is not a substitute for either of these clinical tools or for an in-person medical risk assessment.
What Does MET Mean?
MET stands for Metabolic Equivalent of Task — a way of measuring how much energy an activity takes compared to resting. Sitting quietly is 1 MET; brisk walking is about 3–4 METs; running is 8+ METs. "MET/week" totals combine activity intensity and duration into one number.
Full Scoring Table
| Category | Points |
|---|---|
| Age | 0–5 |
| BMI | 0–3 |
| Diabetes status | 0–4 |
| Diabetes duration | 0–3 |
| Exercise frequency | 0–3 |
| Sugary drink intake | 0–4 |
| Smoking | 0–3 |
| Blood pressure | 0–3 |
| Shortness of breath | 0–5 |
| Swelling | 0–5 |
| Cholesterol | 0–2 |
| Family history | 0–2 |
| Daily activity level | 0–3 |
| Diet pattern | 0–4 |
| Last check-up | 0–3 |
Note: diabetes treatment type (medication, insulin, CGM, pump) is recorded in your answers but currently carries 0 points — it does not add to or subtract from your score.
Data Sources
Mexico-specific statistics referenced throughout HeartGuard are drawn from the World Heart Federation and World Health Organization Global Health Observatory data.