it's all about risk

Recently my partner gave me the tip of showing people their 10 year forecast of cardiovascular risk. The computer uses data of age, BMI (Body Mass Index), drinking and smoking habit, cholesterol level and of course blood pressure. It crunches the numbers and comes up with a percentage risk of a "cardiovascular event" (stroke or heart attack) occurring in the next 10 years. A patient this afternoon, an old friend and, as it happens, with similar indices to myself except that he is 3 years younger. His score came in at 19%
"A little bit too high, wouldn't you say?" I offered.
"Yes, I think so too" was his response.

We spent the next 15 minutes working out how he can get the figure down to 10%. What I'll do about my own (which is 22%, mainly due to my heavy smoking) is another matter entirely...