Black patients with high blood pressure, also known as hypertension, have a twofold risk of sudden cardiac death (SCD) regardless of other common risk factors such as age, gender, family history and pre-existing heart disease

The increased rate of SCD in blacks may be in part attributable to an increased prevalence of mutations in the cardiac sodium channel gene SCN5A that may predispose them to the development of fatal and nonfatal ventricular arrhythmias.