January 7, 2016: The Aga Khan University’s Department of Community Health Sciences and international collaborators have received an award to study ways to lower hypertension in adults living in rural South Asia.
The study will test low-cost strategies by health workers and doctors to lower blood pressure among adults and reduce their risk of heart disease in three key countries – Bangladesh, Pakistan and Sri Lanka – in South Asia where hypertension is a rapidly growing problem.
“Hypertension, or high blood pressure, has reached epidemic proportions in Pakistan, affecting one in three adults 45 years or older,” said Dr Imtiaz Jehan, the principal investigator of the study in Pakistan and an associate professor at AKU’s Department of Community Health Sciences. “ It is largely un-recognized illness and lowering blood pressure can be the single most important way to prevent the rising rates of heart disease and deaths in the country.”
Ismailimail 