The Inaugural Elijah B. Saunders Memorial Lecture: The Global Consequences of Hypertension and Related Disparities

Abstract

<p>This inaugural memorial lecture provides an opportunity to celebrate the life of Elijah B. Saunders, MD, FACC and pays tribute to his pioneering spirit in the quest to advance health equity in the prevention and control of hypertension and cardiovascular diseases. It also enables an assessment of the state of the global burden of hypertension and related disparities. Despite the remarkable biomedical research progress made over the last half-century, hypertension remains the leading risk factor for global disease burden and the major preventable contributor to cardiovascular and all-cause mortality. Additionally, disparities in hypertension-related morbidity and mortality remain pervasive worldwide. National hypertension control rates showing progress often mask important suboptimal treatment and control in population groups defined by sex, race, ethnicity, geography, and social and environmental determinants. Within these groups, many hypertension-related disparities remain largely unchanged while other gaps have widened. In essence, current research has been relatively ineffective in guiding largescale, sustained elimination of hypertension-related disparities. An important explanation for these observations may be the significant advances made in observational epidemiological research, especially in improved surveillance and data collection that document the extent of disparities in marked contrast to the relative paucity of interventional disparities research. The paucity of these interventional research studies remains a continuing challenge. The time has come for renewed efforts in building strategic partnerships that leverage transdisciplinary, multi-sectoral expertise to provide global leadership in interventional implementation research for hypertension control and elimination of related disparities. Developing an appropriately skilled implementation research workforce will be crucial. The National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute and its biomedical research funding partners remain committed to a strategic agenda of implementation research, training, and education for the prevention and control of hypertension and elimination of related disparities. <em>Ethn Dis. </em>2016;26(3):461-468; doi:10.18865/ed.26.3.461 </p>