Deaths due to heart failure and hypertensive heart disease are increasing in the United States, particularly in Black women and men, despite medical and surgical advances in heart disease management, according to a Northwestern Medicine study.

The study used standard data collected from death certificates across the country between 1999 and 2018 to identify trends across time in deaths from leading causes of heart disease deaths, namely ischemic heart disease, heart failure, heart disease related to high blood pressure, valvular heart disease, arrhythmias, heart disease related to lung disease, and other heart diseases, in Black and white women and men, across age groups and in urban and rural areas. The data source was the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention's WONDER database.

The study found heart failure and hypertensive heart disease is growing rapidly.

"These findings are alarming," said senior study author Sadiya Khan, assistant professor of preventive medicine at Northwestern University Feinberg School of Medicine and a Northwestern Medicine physician. "Despite medical and surgical advances in heart disease management and public policy initiatives around blood pressure awareness, we are losing ground in the battle against heart failure and hypertension. And the disparities in heart disease are clear."

Between 2011 and 2018, the death rate due to heart disease declined by 0.7 percent per year. Over this same time period, the death rate due specifically to ischemic heart disease declined by 2.6 percent per year.

But these gains were offset by significant increases in deaths due to heart failure -- 3.5 percent per year, and hypertensive heart disease -- 4.8 percent per year.

In total, deaths from heart disease in 2018 accounted for 3.8 million potential years of life lost with 30 percent and 60 percent greater years of life lost for Blacks compared with white men and women, respectively.

The disparities observed in heart failure and hypertensive heart diseases are likely due to higher rates of high blood pressure, obesity and diabetes in Black women and men, Khan said.

"We have to recognize and address that the root causes of these disparities arise from differences in social determinants of health, such as socioeconomic status and access to care, and structural and systemic racism in our country," Khan said.

The study was published Thursday in the British Medical Journal.

Northwestern Medicine is the collaboration between Northwestern Memorial HealthCare and Northwestern University Feinberg School of Medicine, which includes research, teaching and patient care.