A new analysis has shown disparities in cardiovascular risk factors between black and white adults in the United States, disparities that may be largely attributable to social determinants of health.
Investigators analyzed 20 years of data on over 50,500 US adults drawn from the National Health and Nutrition Examination Surveys (NHANES) and found that, in the overall population, body mass index (BMI) and hemoglobin A1c were significantly increased between 1999 and 2018, while serum total cholesterol and cigarette smoking were significantly decreased. Mean systolic blood pressure (BP) decreased between 1999 and 2010, but then increased after 2010.
The mean age- and sex-adjusted estimated 10-year risk for atherosclerotic cardiovascular disease (ASCVD) was consistently higher in black participants vs white participants, but the difference was attenuated after further adjusting for education, income, home ownership, employment, health insurance, and access to healthcare.
"These findings are helpful to guide the development of national public health policies for targeted interventions aimed at eliminating health disparities," Jiang He, MD, PhD, Joseph S. Copes Chair and professor of epidemiology, Tulane University School of Public Health and Tropical Medicine, New Orleans, Louisiana, told theheart.org | Medscape Cardiology.
"Interventions on social determinants of cardiovascular health should be tested in rigorous designed intervention trials," said He, who is also the director of the Tulane University Translational Science Institute.
