Socioeconomic status and morbidity and mortality in hypertensive blacks

Despite an overall limited range of social and economic opportunities in the recent past, blacks of lower socioeconomic status have experienced marked excesses in hypertension-related burdens compared with their more advantaged peers: the incidence, prevalence, and severity of hypertension and its end-organ sequelae increased with decreasing educational achievement and the 5-year mortality was two times higher for black hypertensives of lower than higher educational achievement under conditions of usual care in U.S. communities in the 1970s. The Stepped Care program of antihypertensive pharmacologic therapy of the HDFP reduced all-cause mortality by 19% for black hypertensive men and 28% for black women. The HDFP also eliminated the association of mortality with educational achievement; the favorable impact of the program was greatest in the group at highest risk, blacks of lowest socioeconomic status.