The Roseto Effect: Cohesive Relationships Reduce Prevalence of Myocardial Infarction

A study of Roseto, a homogeneous Italian-American community in Pennsylvania, and other nearby towns between 1955 and 1965 lead to the conclusion that lower Myocardial Infarction rates in Roseto were due to their cohesive family and community relationships. Following a period of erosion of traditionally cohesive family and community relationships, Myocardial infarction rates in Roseto rose as predicted to match those of neighboring towns. This is now commonly known as the Roseto effect.

Resources

Egolf B, Lasker J, Wolf S, Potvin L. The Roseto effect: a 50-year comparison of mortality rates. American Journal of Public Health. 1992;82(8):1089-1092. https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC1695733/

See original article: Roseto Effect

https://ajph.aphapublications.org/doi/pdf/10.2105/AJPH.82.8.1089

Other studies have shown the importance of relationships to health.

Blue Zones
The Harvard Longitudinal Study

About the Author

Dr. Kenneth Acha, MD, DMin.

Kenneth’s mission is to use medicine, spiritual formation, poverty alleviation, and leadership development to help people live lives to the fullest. He holds two doctorate degrees: the first is in medicine and the second is in spiritual formation. He is a practicing U.S. physician, an assistant professor of medicine, and a senior professor of leadership and spiritual formation at Servants University (SU). Kenneth is also a core faculty in the department of orphan care and poverty alleviation at SU and the founder and president of the Kenneth Acha Foundation, an organization that has helped thousands of orphans in Cameroon and trained many leaders since 2005.

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