New immigrants to North America may be less likely to have a stroke at a young age than long-time residents, according to a study published in the February 3, 2010, online issue of Neurology®, the medical journal of the American Academy of Neurology.
For the study, researchers identified all new immigrants to Ontario, Canada, over a 12-year period and matched them to people of the same age and gender who had lived in Ontario for at least five years. A total of 966,000 new immigrants were matched to more than 3.2 million long-term residents. The participants were age 16 to 65 at the start of the study, with an average age of 34.
The researchers then followed all of the participants for an average of about six years. During that time, there were 933 strokes among the new immigrants and 5,283 strokes among the long-term residents. This is a rate of 1.7 strokes per person per year in new immigrants and 2.6 strokes per person per year in long-term residents, or a 30 percent lower rate for new immigrants.
The results were the same after adjusting for income level, smoking, and history of other diseases such as high blood pressure and diabetes.