Cardiovascular risk in the immigrant population from Southern Asia

Cardiovascular disease is the first cause of death in both developed and developing countries, including those of the Indian subcontinent. Persons from Pakistan, India, Bangladesh, Nepal and Sri Lanka have one of the highest rates of ischemic heart disease, which is diagnosed 10. years earlier than in Caucasians from Western Europe. Several studies have confirmed that the risk of myocardial infarction in the population from the Indian subcontinent is mainly due to traditional cardiovascular risk factors, while non-traditional factors such as homocysteine or C-reactive protein play a lesser role.Primary care centers in the city of Barcelona that attend most of the immigrants from these countries use Regicor tables to estimate the risk of a coronary episode in the next 10. years. The Regicor table is an adaptation of the Framingham table for the population of Gerona, a region with a low risk of cardiovascular disease. Recently, two new risk functions have been evaluated in patients from southern Asia: the modified Framingham scale and the QRISK2, which could be useful in estimating cardiovascular risk in this immigrant population. © 2011 Elsevier España, S.L. y SEA.