$2 million to tackle heart health inequities

The Heart Foundation and the Healthier Lives National Science Challenge have joined forces to tackle inequities in health outcomes from cardiovascular disease among Māori and Pacific people.

A $2 million research grant has been awarded to a team led by Dr Corina Grey and Associate Professor Matire Harwood in the University of Auckland's Faculty of Medical and Health Sciences.

The three-year study is the first major programme of its kind in Aotearoa New Zealand. It aims to improve access to healthcare for Māori and Pacific people, which has the potential to achieve equity in heart health outcomes for all New Zealanders.

The research involves finding out what barriers people face in accessing healthcare and coming up with a plan to reduce them.

Available approaches to prevention and treatment have the potential to halve the risk of heart disease but Māori and Pacific people are less likely to receive treatment and more likely to suffer from and die of heart disease than other New Zealanders. On average, Māori and Pacific people’s lives are seven years shorter than other New Zealanders. Barriers to accessing healthcare are considered to be important contributors to this.

The researchers will explore how the risk of heart disease is assessed and managed, and what can be done to reduce delays and improve access to hospital care and post-hospital management of heart disease. They will then develop a roadmap for health policy makers and providers, which could alter the way healthcare is delivered across primary and secondary care.

The research team will use kaupapa Māori and Pacific research methodologies for the study’s design, methods and analysis.

Dr Corina Grey, from the University of Auckland's School of Population Health, a public health doctor of Samoan heritage and leading researcher in Pacific and heart health, will co-lead the team of researchers. “This is a total dream project. We’ve got an amazing team and it’s what we’ve been working towards for such a long time,” she says.

Co-leader Associate Professor Matire Harwood (Ngāpuhi with whakapapa connections to Ngāti Rangi, Te Mahurehure and Ngāti Hine) is a leading Māori health researcher based at the same school and a practicing GP.

“We’re bringing together an excellent team with different expertise, from GPs to epidemiologists, who have all done a ton of work looking at equity and heart disease," she says. "We have the experience and it’s now time to use that to inform health policy makers and services in New Zealand.”

Healthier Lives Director Professor Jim Mann says, “Healthier Lives is delighted to be partnering with the Heart Foundation in this joint venture which will help to realise our vision of Aotearoa New Zealand with equitable health outcomes and a substantially reduced burden of cardiovascular diseases."

“This is an important programme of work from a group of experienced researchers, led by Dr Corina Grey, a current Heart Foundation Fellow. We look forward to following the research and its impact on improving equity in heart health in Aotearoa,“ says Gerry Devlin, Medical Director of the Heart Foundation.