South Asians Have Greater
Heart Attack Risk
Washington,
DC: People native to South Asia are at greater risk of heart
attack at a younger age than other people because of factors
that include lifestyle choices such as smoking, a study published
in the Journal of the American Medical Association said on
Tuesday.
India, Pakistan, Bangladesh, Sri Lanka and Nepal account for
about a quarter of the world’s population and have the
highest proportion of cardiovascular diseases compared with
any other region globally.
An international team of researchers led by Dr Prashant Joshi
of the Government Medical College, Nagpur, India, looked at
the possibility that South Asians have a special susceptibility
for acute myocardial infarction (heart attack) that was not
explained by traditional risk factors.
The study included 1,732 heart attack patients and 2,204 controls
from 15 medical centers in five South Asian countries and
10,728 heart attack cases and 12,431 controls from other countries.
The researchers found that the average age for a first heart
attack was lower in South Asian countries, 53.0 years, than
in other countries, 58.8 years. Protective risk factors, such
as leisure time, physical activity, regular alcohol intake,
and daily intake of fruits and vegetables, were markedly lower
in South Asian study participants.
Some harmful factors were more common in native South Asians
than in foreigners: history of diabetes, smoking, history
of hypertension, psychosocial factors such as depression and
stress at work or home, and an elevated ratio of ApoB/ApoA-I
ratio, a protein/lipid.
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