Active Pregnancy, Children & Inherited Conditions Lungs & Breathing

Understanding intergenerational transmission of poor cardiovascular health in Africa (GenHeart Study)

Funder Wellcome Charity-funded
Recipient organisation University of the Witwatersrand
Funding £2.6M
Period May 2024 — Apr 2032

In plain English

AI plain-English summary

A South African study tracking three generations of families will measure parents’ blood vessels, heart function, and kidneys before pregnancy to see how these traits shape the health of their children up to age five. People of African descent face unusually high risks of hypertension, stroke, and dangerous blood-pressure disorders in pregnancy. Earlier work by this team found that 21–44 percent of the variation in key measures of artery thickness and heart mass is inherited across generations. But the biological chain that passes this vulnerability from parent to child remains unknown. This project will fill that gap by collecting detailed cardiovascular data before conception, during pregnancy, and in early childhood, while also tracking common hazards such as tobacco, poor diet, and air pollution. If the research succeeds, it could identify the specific life stages and exposures where interventions would most effectively break the cycle of inherited heart disease. Public-health policies—for example, targeting young adults’ vascular health before they become parents—could then be designed to reduce the burden of hypertension and stroke across generations in African populations.

View original technical description
People of African descent have increased risk for hypertension, stroke, and hypertensive disorders in pregnancy. This poor cardiovascular health is in part heritable. Across three generations in South African families (with a prior Welcome seed award) I reported the inherited proportion of phenotypic trait variation was estimated at 23-44% for carotid intima media thickness (cIMT) and 21-39% for cardiac left ventricular mass indexed to body surface area (LVMI). However, the mechanisms underlying this heritability are not well understood and require large, longitudinal studies with data collected in preconception, pregnancy, and early life. This proposal seeks to leverage such a study and to nest cardiovascular phenotyping within assessments at each life stage for parents and offspring. The aims are to evaluate the role of preconception parental vascular compliance, endothelial dysfunction, cardiac and renal function in determining the extent of maternal cardiovascular adaption to pregnancy and the impact on fetal growth, pregnancy outcomes and postpartum maternal and child cardiovascular health in the first 5yrs of life. Further examining the impact of common hazardous exposures (tobacco, poor diet, and air pollution) at each life stage. This highly cost-effective proposal will inform public health policy and intervention strategies to reduce intergenerational disease transmission.

View the original record at the funder ↗

Researchers

Lisa Ware (EPMC Awardee)

Related Research

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Original classification

Career Development Award

Plain English summaries and category classifications on this site are generated by AI and may not perfectly reflect the original research.