At the front of the class, Kevin Shah, MD, a cardiologist in the Spencer Fox Eccles School of Medicine at the University of Utah and the head of U-SACHI, recapped what the group had covered in a year of monthly health classes. 
 
But Shah’s mission to improve cardiovascular health in South Asian populations began nearly 20 years earlier.
 
 “This is a personal issue for me,” Shah says. “I’m South Asian, I’m a cardiologist, and I chose medicine as a profession because of a personal loss.” Shah’s father passed away due to a heart attack at age 54. Shah was 20.
 
Such a loss is sadly not uncommon. Compared to other ethnic groups, people from India, Pakistan, Nepal, and other South Asian countries are more at risk of severe and early heart disease, which tends to develop about 10 years earlier than in other populations. South Asian populations also tend to have heart attacks at earlier ages. 
 
The reasons why aren’t totally clear. Some of the known risk factors for heart disease, including diabetes and sedentary lifestyles, are more common in South Asian populations, and additional genetic factors probably raise the risk even further, Shah says.