Wium-Andersen MK, et al. - Given an increased risk of cardiovascular disease in those with mood disorders, researchers examined if shared genetic and early environmental factors could explain the risk of cardiovascular disease in individuals with mood disorder. From two large population-based studies, they included 6,714 Danish middle and old aged twins and performed individual-level and intra-pair analyses of the association between self-reported depression symptomatology scores and register-based diagnoses of ischemic heart disease on them. They observed a higher incidence of ischemic heart disease in correlation to higher depression symptomatology scores (both total, affective and somatic) following multivariable adjustment in individual-level analyses. Comparable association was noted in intra-pair analyses, but with slightly larger confidence intervals. The twin scoring highest on depressive symptoms within twin pairs developed ischemic heart disease more often or earlier than the lower scoring twin. As per findings, the association between depressive mood and ischemic heart disease could not be explained by genetic factors and early life environment.