September 30, 2001 - Wayne State University College of Nursing Associate Professor Nancy Artinian, PhD, RN and Assistant Professor Olivia G.M. Washington, PhD, RN have been awarded a $1.34 million federal grant to study blood pressure telemonitoring among African-Americans.

The four-year National Institutes of Health-National Institute for Nursing Research (NIH-NINR) grant will allow the researchers to assess the effectiveness of using a home telemonitoring device to track and control high blood pressure among African-Americans.

"Hypertension is called the silent killer," says Artinian, the project's principal investigator. "For African-Americans, high blood pressure occurs at an earlier onset age and average blood pressures are much higher than Caucasians, therefore they're at much greater risk. If it is not detected and it goes uncontrolled for a long period of time, then individuals are more at risk for major health problems such as stroke, heart disease and end-stage renal disease."

Further, Artinian says the incidence level for these complications among African-American high blood pressure patients is as much as three times higher than the general population.

"Surveys show that since 1991, we have not made much progress in blood pressure control," says co-principal investigator Washington. "In fact, it seems to have been replaced by signs that untreated blood pressure among Americans is a very serious problem."

The project will include 400 African-Americans half of whom will be assigned to home telemonitoring. The telemonitoring group will use a device to monitor their blood pressure. The device connects to a phone and then transmits the data to Life Link Monitoring Services, which generates a report and faxes it to the research team allowing the team to monitor patients' blood pressure on a regular basis. Each week, a nurse will contact the patients within the telemonitoring group. The nurse will be able to counsel patients about lifestyle modification (diet, weight/physical activity, alcohol consumption, etc.).The control group will receive traditional medical care without the telemonitoring.

In addition to Artinian and Washington, the research team includes co-investigator Cathy Kai-Lin Jen, PhD of Wayne State University's Department of Nutrition and Food Science, co-investigator John Flack, MD, MPH of the WSU School of Medicine and co-investigator/statistician Thomas Templin, PhD associate professor (research) of the College of Nursing.