Medical scans performed on 22 mummies from the Museum of Antiquities in Cairo showed evidence of possible heart disease in three of them.

The scientists also found three more with hardened arteries.

Researchers and scientists from the University of California, Wisconsin Heart Hospital, the Mid America Heart Institute and the Al Azhar Medical School in Cairo participated in the study, and the details were published in the Journal of American Medical Association.

Five expert cardiovascular imaging physicians checked the x-rays of the 22 Egyptian mummies. The results showed that 16 had identifiable hearts or arteries left in their bodies after being mummified, and the others had calcified deposits in the walls of their arteries.

The team, composed of US and Egyptian scientists, said the subjects had high socio-economic status and were either priests or priestesses who served in the court of the Pharaoh.

Dr. Randall C. Thompson of the Mid-America Heart Institute in Kansas City, Missouri said, “We have every reason to believe they were wealthy individuals because of the cost of mummification. In upper-class older and middle-age Egyptians, atherosclerosis was not uncommon.”