Hypertension Disparity Linked to Environment

Social environment may play a greater role in the disparity between the numbers of African Americans living with hypertension compared to non-Hispanic whites with the disease. A study by researchers at the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health found that the disparity was substantially reduced when comparing groups of African Americans and non-Hispanic whites living in similar social environments. The results are published in the November 2008 print edition of Social Science and Medicine. “Our study found that nearly 31 percent of the hypertension disparity among African Americans and non-Hispanic whites is attributable to environmental factors,” says Roland James Thorpe Jr., PhD, lead author of the study and an assistant scientist with the Bloomberg School’s Hopkins Center for Health Disparities Solutions. “These findings show that ethnic disparities could be linked to a number of factors other than race. Careful review of psychosocial factors, stress, coping strategies, discrimination and other personality characteristics could play a large role in reducing or eliminating the disparity.” Comment: This has good biologic plausibility and may be more the underlying cause of health disparities than access to health services. Hans Selye MD discussed the roles of stress back in the 1950s. We keep forgetting history.