CVD+in+American+Indians

__** Summary **__
 * How changes in lifestyle (stress, physical activity and diet) of American Indians has affected their risk of Cardiovascular Disease**

Today, American Indians are at high risk for Cardiovascular Disease (CVD) as well as many diseases that can be a precursor for CVD, such as diabetes, obesity and hypertension. While all American are at high risk for these diseases, American Indians in particular have higher rates of CVD and obesity. This problem can be linked to their way of living and how it has been changed from their pre-colonial period to modern times. Lifestyle factors such as diet, activity level and stress have contributed a lot to this growing problem. The new stress in their lives have possibly lead to things such as alcohol and drug abuse that causes further physical and mental health problems.

__** The Problem **__

The risk of cardiovascular disease (CVD) is a rising problem among the populations of American Indians that remain today. Although this is an increasing problem with all Americans, the rates of CVD and Coronary heart disease (CHD) in American Indians exceeds those of other United States populations. Research in Montana has shown that the risk of heart-disease and stroke in American Indians is significantly higher than the white population.

__**The Causes of CVD**__

Cardiovascular Disease can be caused by mainly different problems with either the heart or the blood vessels. What happens inside the body to cause CVD is a buildup of fatty plaques in your arteries, which is then solidified by a layer of calcium. Overtime, this buildup will slowly make the diameter of the artery smaller, and eventually, will be small enough that something within the blood system gets caught at that point and cuts off the flow of blood and oxygen to needed areas such as the heart. The main lifestyle behaviors that cause this are: These risks are also associated with mainly other problems/diseases that are independent predictors of CVD such as high cholesterol, high blood pressure, albuminuria, triglycerides, obesity, diabetes and mainly other problems. This is a table showing the obesity rates of American Indians compared to all races in both men and women. This clearly shows a significantly higher obesity rate among American Indians.
 * · Physical Inactivity or sedentary lifestyle
 * · Poor Diet
 * · Stress
 * · Smoking [[image:cardiovasculardiseaseinamericanindians:indian2.png align="right" caption="Rates of Obesity in Native Americans from http://www.faqs.org/nutrition/Met-Obe/Native-Americans-Diet-of.html"]]
 * · Age and Gender (not behaviors, but affect chances of CVD)

__**Pre-European Lifestyle**__

There were one estimated almost 24 million American Indians, and there was a wide variety of diets among different tribes depending on where they lived and the resources that were available to them. The Native American lifestyle was reasonably healthy before the Europeans can over. Their diets consisted of go

od meats and veggies, and they were always on the move. Natives had a triad of vegetables that they planted that consisted of corn (maize), beans and squash. These foods were staples in their diets because they grew at different times during the year and were in abundance. Tribes that had game around them spent time on the move hunting game, and their diets consisted of a mixture of meat and vegetables. Most Native American diets would be considered healthy by today’s standards both in types of food and portion size; Natives only collected the food that they needed to help preserve the land for future use.

The physical activity of the American Indians was incorporated in their daily lives. Things required for survival such as hunting, farming and working to maintain their houses or moving if they were nomadic are forms of moderate to intense level physical activity, and these tasks were performed continuously throughout the day. Tribes also had spiritual rituals such as dances that were performed on a regular basis that were considered physical activity. Some eastern Native American and some Plains Indian tribes participated in a game similar to modern day Lacrosse. This was a very ritualistic game for them, which could consist of up to 100-1,000 men from opposing villages. This form of lacrosse was considered to be a good way to prepare men to be warriors and toughen them up for combat, as well as for recreation and parts of festivals.

Stress in a primitive way of life has one main purpose, and that is the fight or flight response. This response happens when you perceive a significant threat and your body reacts by preparing it to either fight the threat, if it was during war or if an animal attacks you, or flight, if you needed to flee the situation. This reaction in your body shuts down systems that are unneeded and that takes up energy and focuses that energy towards your overall focus and strength or power. The body releases two main hormones into your body to help with this, epinephrine and norepinephrine. These hormones increase the viscosity of your blood and platelets, which will help stop the bleeding if you are severely injured. This response proved to be quite important in survival during primitive times. But the invasion changed a lot of these things and majority of them were not good for the Natives.

__**Post-European Lifestyle**__

Once tribes were sent to reservations their food was subsidized by the government, which meant that it went through the same corrupted hands that stole their lands from them. Often, most of the food didn’t make it to the tribes that were awaiting them, and this pushed some Natives to the brink of starvation and some even died from lack of nutrition. The food they did receive wasn’t as nutritional as the food they had been surviving on for years. As more and more settlers began moving west, the supply of food from the east began to diminish as well as the natural sources of food. This drop in natural wild life and plant sources was because of the mass movement of whites from the east coast.

Just as their diets had declined, so did the amount of physical activity. One of the ways settlers tricked the Natives into stealing their lands led to a more sedentary lifestyle for them, this was called allotment. This was the process of taking Native lands and dividing it up into small sections for each family in the tribe, and all the remaining land after was either bought by the government or taken. By forcing the Natives to live on a small piece of land and receive their food, medicine and clothing from the government it cause them to become stationary. Once Nomadic tribes because sedentary and decreased the need to perform daily tasks such as hunting and gathering to survive.

New stressors were added to the Natives lives. Fight or flight was not the only thing that caused stress in their lives now, white settlers became the focus. Things such as quality of living, source of food, and the destruction of the only culture they have known for years became the focus stressors in their lives. Like mentioned before blood becomes thicker when a person is under stress, and this increased viscosity of blood is a large part of the process of heart diseases. Once there is an injury to the walls of artery, the injury causes a buildup of tissue like a scar, and this acts like a stone dropped into a creek, visit it in 5 or 10 years and there will be debris piled up around it just like plaque in your artery. The decreases in these three areas had a huge effect on the health of Native Americans.

Today, they have high rates of diabetes, obesity, CVD, mental illness and suicide as well as many other health related problems. Some studies have found a correlation between health-related problems and substance abuse. They believe that it is a coping mechanism for the stress brought on by historical trauma, traumatic life events, discrimination and violent crimes. This stress ends up leading to increased health problems, alcohol and drug abuse and mental illnesses.

__**Conclusion**__

Native Americans lived a healthy lifestyle which was support by a good diet, regular physical activity and good stresses in life. But this all changed along with their culture with the invasion of Europeans. In the pursuit of Native lands the new comers made the Natives a sedentary people and subsidized their food with a poor diet. All these new problems added a lot of stress to their once simple lives. With this huge change in their culture, diets, physical activity and stress, came an increased risk of diseases such as cardiovascular disease, obesity, hypertension, diabetes and hypercholesterolemia. The lifestyles of Natives today aren’t the way they were when the settlers came over, but there is still an increasing problem with the diseases listed above. This can now be contributed to heredity as well as the lifestyle factors talked about.

Sources: [] This article gave me some good statistics to read about and just a general knowledge on the levels of CVD in American Indians. [] This gave a study on the rising numbers of heart related diseases. All Americans have high risk of CVD, but Native Americans have higher rates in almost all areas. [] This site talked about and gave information on CVD and the risks factors that contribute to it, such as the lifestyle factors talked about in the wikispace. [] Mayoclinic.com gave me a very credible source to learn from as well as information on the causes and risks of CVD and other heart related diseases. [] This site talks about how CVD begins and the factors that cause the onset, atherosclerosis. [] This gave me information on the diets and lifestyles of the Natives pre-Europeans. [] This gave me an idea of diets and food sources of Native Americans. [] Mypyramid.com gave me information on what a healthy diet requires, and this helped me to see that the diet of Native Americans before settlers came over was pretty well balanced and nutritious. [] This wiki gave me definition and information on the main stress response that Natives had before the invasion of Europeans. [] This site gave me a photo of the lacrosse game as well as information into how it was played, who played it and why it was played within Indian Nations. This was the only form of leisure physical activity that I found. [] This study looked at how American Indians use substance abuse as a coping mechanism for the stress in their lives, and what these mechanisms can lead to in the future. [] This site gave me a good chart to use and learn from that talked about the different lifestyle risk factors for CVD and other diseases. [] This gave me the charts and statistics on obesity, CVD, hypertension and hypercholesterolemia to help give credibility to my subject as well as a visual learning aid. [] This site gave me really good information on the diets of Native Americans and how Europeans affected their lives. It also gave me some information on problems the Natives encountered with the subsidized food. [] This site gives percentages and information about heart diseases among American Indians and the causes of this. [] This gave a general idea of what Native American diets are like and what their meals and lives were like, and how their diets changed after the Europeans arrived. [] This talked about the relationship of stress and diseases such as diabetes. This was a credible study that looked at how the stress of modern Natives effects their heart health. [] This site gave information into the prevalence of obesity and the lifestyle factors that contribute to it. Obesity is one of the main independent factors that can lead to the onset of CVD and other diseases.