South Asians Engaging in Hypertension Awareness & Treatment (SAEHAT)

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DESCRIPTION (provided by applicant): Hypertension is a major risk factor for heart disease and stroke. Healthy People 2010 objectives include increasing the proportion of adults with hypertension who are taking action to control it to 95%, and increasing the proportion of adults with controlled BP to 50%. The rate of cardiovascular (CVD) disease among South Asians is the highest in the world. Elevated blood pressure is part of a metabolic syndrome putting South Asians at extremely high CVD risk. South Asian immigrants, from countries including India, Pakistan, and Bangladesh, are among the fastest growing segment of our population. The U.S. is home to over 1.67 million 'Asian Indians'. From 1990 to 2000, the Bangladeshi population in the United States increased by 248%, and the Pakistani by 89%. New York City is a magnet for South Asian immigrants. Because of the severe cardiovascular morbidity, identification of those at risk, modification of their risk factors, and facilitating access to health care are imperative. South Asians Engaging in Hypertension Awareness and Treatment (SAEHAT) addresses the glaring gap in hypertension education and service linkage for South Asian Americans. The aims of SAEHAT are: Aim I: To develop and increase capacity building to support community-based participatory education, research, and training to reduce cardiovascular disparities; Aim II: To develop a community-based participatory research program to reduce cardiovascular disease disparities; Aim III: To design and assess through a randomized control study the efficacy of a scalable video-based education and navigator intervention in improving access to a) hypertension care, and b) to cardiovascular disease risk factor diagnosis in the South Asian American community. It is hypothesized that SAEHAT will thereby decrease the South Asian American risk for cardiovascular disease. Specifically, we hypothesize that the video navigator intervention will lead to: 1) increases in medical evaluations for hypertension; 2) increases in the likelihood of being on medication for hypertension; and 3) better rates of controlled blood pressure. Further, an outgrowth of these increased medical evaluations will be the diagnosis and treatment of additional cardiovascular risk factors, either alone or in combination as the metabolic syndrome.