Cerebrovascular disease in South Asia – Part I: A burning problem

Stroke is a non-communicable disease of increasing socioeconomic importance in ageing populations. According to the World Health Organization, stroke was the second most common cause of worldwide mortality. In South Asian countries demographic changes, urbanization and increased exposure to major stroke risk factors will fuel the stroke burden in the future. The prevalence of stroke in India is 44–843/100,000 (from community-based studies), 500–2000/100,000 in Bangladesh, 218/100,000 in Pakistan and 1000/100,000 in Sri Lanka and community-based prevalence studies in these countries are still lacking. There are no data on stroke prevalence from Nepal. Incidence studies are still less and an Indian study reported an incidence of 145/100,000. Incidence studies from other South Asian countries are lacking. This review attempts to give an overview of the evidence so far on the burden of stroke in this part of the globe.