– Heart disease impact on South Asians
– Blood vessel repairs and heart disease connection in South Asians.
By Trend News Line 2024-02-13 09:00:00.
Heart disease progresses more rapidly in individuals of South Asian ethnicity, and a recent study conducted in Canada suggests that the reason behind this may lie in faulty repairs to blood vessel damage. Cardiovascular disease affects the heart and blood vessels, potentially leading to the need for bypass surgery and other medical interventions.
Previous estimates by researchers indicated that individuals from the Indian subcontinent, which includes India, Pakistan, Bangladesh, Sri Lanka, and over 50 other South Asian origins, develop cardiovascular disease about five to 10 years earlier than their white European counterparts. Furthermore, their death rates after a heart attack are higher.
Published in the Journal of the American College of Cardiology, the study involved researchers from Canada, the United States, and Ireland. They discovered that South Asian patients with heart disease or diabetes had fewer vascular regenerative and reparative cells compared to white patients.
Dr. Subodh Verma, a cardiac surgeon at St. Michael’s Hospital in Toronto and a professor at the University of Toronto, stated that these findings suggest that South Asian individuals have a unique susceptibility to heart disease due, in part, to their inability to mount an adequate reparative response.
The study compared 60 South Asian adults with 60 white Europeans who had either documented cardiovascular disease or established diabetes, as well as at least one risk factor for heart disease. The researchers found a significant reduction in two critical types of stem cells in the South Asian subjects, indicating a reduced ability to repair and regenerate blood vessels in response to diabetes.
Dr. Jaideep Patel, a Canadian preventive cardiologist at Johns Hopkins Hospital, who was not involved in the study, praised the authors for their efforts but emphasized the need for more research. Patel noted that the study’s limitation was its exclusion of healthy participants, leaving unanswered questions about how atherosclerotic cardiovascular disease and other risk factors affect stem cells.
Moving forward, the study’s authors aim to determine whether the identified biological difference can be used to identify individuals at earlier risk and explore potential treatments that could be administered earlier.
Funding for the study was provided by the Heart and Stroke Foundation of Canada and the Canadian Institutes of Health Research..
1. Heart disease impact on South Asians
2. Blood vessel repairs’ clue on heart disease in South Asians.