Heart Failure Common Among Poor Sector

According to the research of the specialists from Cedars Sinai Medical Center, which is also funded by the National Institute of Health, poor women are more prone to heart failure, despite efforts to curb the disease such as measures of health and well being.
Furthermore, the study also revealed that the educational background of the person also poses risk to the development of heart failure. According to the report, women who did not finish high school were at higher risk as compared to those who received a higher educational attainment.
The findings, according to Dr. Harlan Krumholz who is a cardiologist at the Yale School of Medicine in New Haven, is a kind of “double insult.” “They have to deal with social circumstances, and then when people get sick in that situation, it gets a whole lot worse. We need to try to intervene early to prevent these things from happening,” he added.
The study engaged about 26,000 healthy and post-menopausal individuals who were also part of the National Institute of Medicine Women’s Health Initiative. At the onset of the research, the researchers took note of the women’s income level, health and lifestyle routines, as well as educational background and level.
For the next eight years, the researchers checked the medical records of these women biannually in order to determine which among these women were hospitalized or diagnosed with heart failure. In sum, about 663 cases of heart failure were recorded.

Every single year, there is an average of 57 cases per 10,000 women who have a household income of about $20,000 per year were found to have heart failure. Those with annual income of about $50,000 recorded about 17 out of 10,000 women.

After a careful consideration of the women’s race, health and lifestyles, as well as their vices, the researchers were still able to reveal that women in the lowest income brackets had 56% higher risks of developing heart failure, compared to women with higher amounts of wealth. Furthermore, women who were not able to finish high school were 21% more at risk for developing heart failure than those who finished college.

Said the researchers, there are two primary key drivers of heart failure risks among poor women. First is that poorer women have less communication for the professional help of doctors, and second is that they have less access to preventive care facilities and programs. As for Krumholz, the results of the study should serve as a challenge to the doctors in providing care to their patients in treating underlying diseases like hypertension and to curb the disease before it becomes full blown. He also said that “the risk factors for heart disease, in particular heart failure, are concentrated in certain groups in society, particularly those with low income. When early problems arise that could be intervened on, those aren’t addressed adequately.”

Another reason is that the wealthier sectors are most likely insured by private health insurance companies. These people receive potentially live saving treatments compared to those receiving government funded health insurances.