Cardiovascular Disease in the United States

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Cardiovascular Disease in the United States of America
Cardiovascular disease includes several health conditions that affects the functioning
or the structure of the heart. According to Nhs.uk (2017), conditions that affect the blood
vessels or heart are categorised under general term of cardiovascular disease and is usually
associated with atherosclerosis, that is, fatty deposits in the arteries. Arterial damage can be
linked to damage to the organ it is associated with, that is, eyes, kidneys, heart and brain. The
common cardiovascular disease include coronary artery disease, heart valve disease,
arrhythmias and failure, congenital heart disease and cardiomyopathy. According to
American Heart Association (2019), the leading cause of mortality in the United States of
America is cardiovascular disease, with the count of 840,768 deaths in the year 2016. Nearly
half of the adult population of the America is suffering any kind of cardiovascular disease
and the total prevalence of the disease group is around 9% in the country. The set of disease
associated with heart and blood vessels is the causing immense economic burden in the
country, with estimation of $351.2 billion for the year 2014-15, in which, nearly $213.8
billion was associated with direct cost of cardiovascular disease.
The following sections of the paper will discuss cardiovascular disease in the United
States of America with greater details regarding the sociological determinants of the disease,
epidemiological studies and role of nurses in the primary health care units to address the
health issue associated with the disease.
Social Determinants
Social determinants, as defined by the World Health Organisation, is the
circumstances in which the general population of a sample area are born, live, work, grow
and other subsystems that help to categorize the illness in the region. This definition critically
underlines that health issue is not randomly distributed in the region and neither are the
resources to address the health issues.
Cardiovascular Disease in the United States of America
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According to a report “U.S. Health in International Perspective: Shorter Lives, Poorer
Health” by the Institute of Medicine, socials and adverse economic conditions are the greatest
factors contributing to high prevalence of cardiovascular disease in the United States of
America. Social determinants of cardiovascular disease in the America are highly
interrelated, which makes them difficult to catalog. The following section of the paper will
highlight five social determinants of cardiovascular disease in the chosen region, which have
either contributed in causing the health issue or resolving.
Socioeconomic Position
In a stratified structure of the society, the position status of an individual can be
determined by several categories, including social class and socioeconomic status. However,
the prime factor is the socially derived economic status, which affects the health status of the
population majorly. Socially and economically advantaged group control the resources, be it
cultural, social, political, economic or materialistic, which often dominates or excludes the
disadvantaged groups in the society. Unequal distribution of cardiovascular disease is highly
dependent on the distribution of resources and unequal distribution leads increased exposure
of the disadvantaged group to the disease. The prime markers of socioeconomic position of
an individual includes, education, access to valued activities, environment political voice,
income, wealth and physical insecurity such as violence or crime.
Race and Ethnicity
Race and ethnicity are another crucial determinant of cardiovascular disease in the
USA. The racial and ethnic minorities of the country have disproportionate burden of poor
health. Significant differences in the life expectancy has been observed; the Asian Americans
having average 84.9 years of life expectancy, where the southern rural blacks and other black
in poor urban areas have 71.1 years of life expectancy, a significant difference between the
two. According to the Heart and Stroke Disease Statistics by the American Heart Association,
Cardiovascular Disease in the United States of America
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black people are more prone to die from cardiovascular diseases, 2 to 3 times higher than the
majority of white population. Racism experiences have been linked to increase in the blood
pressure levels in the black population. Moreover, decreased quality of clinical interaction
between the health care professionals and the racial or ethnical minorities affects the health
care process, increasing the burden of poor health in the minorities.
Residential Environment
The basic principles of epidemiology of any disease highlights the importance of
population, place and time in the variation of a disease prevalence. Paradigm shift has been
observed while examining the association of health outcomes and locations considering the
modern epidemiology. According to study conducted by Brown et al. (2011), the research
findings concluded that the population living in the disadvantaged location or region were at
70-90% increased risk of getting affected with cardiovascular disease, in which 40% blacks
were at higher risk due to individual level characteristics. Such increased exposure to disease
is highly dependent on the availability of the socioeconomic resource in the particular region.
Access to Care
Access to medical care determines the risk of individual getting affected by health
issues. The five dimensions that determine this social determinant are affordability,
appropriateness, accommodation, availability, acceptability, and approachability.
Affordability includes the cost associated with health care such as opportunity, indirect and
directs costs, that the individual is capable of spending the resources on. Increased mortality
rate due to cardiovascular diseases have been observed in the population without the support
of insurance or resources available to spend. As the Hispanics and blacks have lower median
household incomes, they have lower access to stroke preventive care or high quality health
care services. Improvement in the attributes that increase the access to care can significantly
reduce the incidence of cardiovascular disease in the United States of America, which has
Cardiovascular Disease in the United States of America
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