Since the inception of this project, we have assembled a cohort of over 11,000 cerebrovascular disease patients whom we are able to follow for stroke outcomes and recurrent cerebrovascular events, as well as mortality.

This gives us tremendous power to detect associations with biological and social risk factors for stroke and stroke recovery, important to Mexican Americans as well as the broader United States population. We have demonstrated increased stroke incidence and recurrence in Mexican Americans. Stroke severity and ischemic stroke subtypes are similar between Mexican Americans and non-Hispanic whites.

Stroke outcomes, including function, cognition, and quality of life, are worse in Mexican Americans. We are positioned to delineate trends in stroke rates, and to explore the potential reasons for the increased stroke burden in Mexican Americans. We will also continue to explore trends in stroke outcomes in Mexican Americans and non-Hispanic whites. This information will be critically important to all populations to reduce the devastation of stroke. We will continue to make important observations useful for planning delivery of stroke care in communities.

We will now investigate outcomes that are important to patients and their families using the Patient-Reported Outcomes Measurement Information System (PROMIS) as well as other measures. We will also examine post-stroke healthcare utilization to identify areas to improve stroke outcomes and reduce ethnic disparities. BASIC has been a very prolific study with more than 95 original peer-reviewed publications.

Indeed, this study is just beginning to provide the rich epidemiologic and clinical data that are necessary to control the epidemic of cerebrovascular disease in Mexican Americans. We know that the next five years will allow us to make contributions that will be directly useful for interventions to reduce health disparities, prevent stroke and improve stroke outcomes in all populations.