HHS HealthBeat (March 1, 2010)

Race and stroke

From the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, I’m Ira Dreyfuss with HHS HealthBeat.

Researchers know that blacks are more likely than whites to die of a stroke. What they’re less clear about is why – whether, for instance, strokes are more common among blacks.

At the University of Alabama at Birmingham, researcher Virginia Howard says blacks may have more strokes. She bases that on five years of data on close to 27,000 people, of whom almost 300 had strokes.

[Virginia Howard speaks] ``The youngest age groups – 45 to 54 – blacks have two and a half times the stroke rate of whites.’’

Howard says blacks – and others at higher risk – should pay attention to things that raise their risk, such as high blood pressure, smoking and diabetes.

The study presented at the American Stroke Association’s International Stroke Conference was supported by the National Institutes of Health.

Learn more at hhs.gov.

HHS HealthBeat is a production of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services. I’m Ira Dreyfuss.

Last revised: May 7, 2011