Heart health
It’s American Heart Month. A look at South Asian Americans’ disproportionately higher risks for cardiovascular ailments.
Issue #15
Hi all —
When photojournalist Eli Imadali and I went over to Sharad Acharya’s suburban Denver home last October, Acharya’s family, who is Nepalese American, were celebrating the last day of the Hindu festival of Navaratri. It was a bitter-cold fall evening, and Eli and I — masked and socially distanced outside — got to meet the family and hear about their experiences, while Eli made portraits of them for our story.
February is American Heart Month, which is meant to bring awareness about cardiovascular health and encourage Americans to adopt healthy lifestyles to prevent heart disease.
South Asian Americans, like Acharya, have a disproportionately higher risk of heart disease and other cardiovascular ailments. Worldwide, South Asians account for 60% of all heart disease cases, even though — at 2 billion people — we make up only a quarter of the planet’s population.
Our story for Kaiser Health News (not affiliated with Kaiser Permanente) published in The Washington Post back in November.
Some takeaways reporting about South Asians’ higher risks:
A 2018 study for the American Heart Association found South Asian Americans are more likely to die of coronary heart disease than other Asian Americans and non-Hispanic white Americans. The study pointed to the community’s high incidences of diabetes and prediabetes as risk factors, as well as high waist-to-hip ratios. People of South Asian descent have a higher tendency to gain visceral fat in the abdomen, which is associated with insulin resistance. South Asian Americans also were found to be less physically active than other ethnic groups in the U.S.
One of the nation’s largest undertakings to understand these risks is the Mediators of Atherosclerosis in South Asians Living in America study, which began in 2006. The MASALA researchers, from institutions such as Northwestern University and the University of California-San Francisco, have examined more than 1,100 South Asian American men and women ages 40-79 to better understand the prevalence and outcomes of cardiovascular disease. They stress that high blood pressure and diabetes are common in the community, even for people at normal weights.
That’s why, Dr. Alka Kanaya, MASALA’s principal investigator and a professor at UCSF, said South Asians cannot rely on traditional body mass index metrics, because BMI numbers considered normal could provide false reassurance to those who might still be at risk.
Kanaya recommends cardiac CT scans, which she said help identify high-risk patients, those who need to make more aggressive lifestyle changes and those who may need preventive medication.
Health care professionals attribute the problem to a mix of genetic, cultural and lifestyle influences — but researchers are advocating for more resources to fully understand it.
Rep. Pramila Jayapal (D-Washington) is sponsoring legislation that would direct $5 million over the next five years toward research into heart disease among South Asian Americans and raising awareness of the issue. The bill passed the U.S. House in September and is up for consideration in the Senate.
It may be American Heart Month now, but I hope these conversations about cardiovascular health in South Asian communities continue year round. There’s a lot at stake.
Thanks for joining the conversation,
Vignesh Ramachandran (@VigneshR)
Co-founder of Red, White and Brown Media
“What will people say?”
There are still a few spots left to attend our free virtual event on Zoom, this Saturday night:
Join us for a night of theatrical readings to explore stories and issues close to the South Asian American community.
Saturday, Feb. 20, 2021
8 p.m. ET/6 p.m. MT/5 p.m. PT on Zoom
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