Our research objectives center on developing and testing a new model to control high blood pressure in a poor, rural area of central Mississippi and investigating the genetic-environmental relationships in high blood pressure. Our control effort centers on the use of indigenous health counselors who were trained to aid in the detection and management of hypertensives. In Year 2 of this research their work centers on the conduct of a baseline survey to determine generalizable statistics on the population, patient follow-up and management, patient health education, community health awareness, selection of volunteer health counselors and training of volunteer health counselors. Also in Year 2 genealogies will be collected on large extended families. These genealogies will be used to construct familial patterns of high blood pressure. An interactive, on-line hypertension registry will be continually used as we screen more of the 86,000 residents in this five (5) county area. Finally, we will develop intervention groups where the trained volunteer health counselors will monitor hypertensives in family and nonfamily settings.
