NHLBI Educational Materials Catalog: NHLBI Stroke Belt Initiaitve
NHLBI Stroke Belt Initiaitve
The National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute (NHLBI) examined the 1980 age-adjusted stroke mortality rates by State. Eleven States had stroke death rates that were more than 10 percent higher than the U.S. average: Alabama, Arkansas, Georgia, Indiana, Kentucky, Louisiana, Mississippi, North Carolina, South Carolina, Tennessee, and Virginia. Ten of these States are in a contiguous cluster in the Southeast. Indiana, the remaining State, is located on the northern border of the Southeast cluster. The NHLBI designated these 11 States as the Stroke Belt.