CARDIOVASCULAR JOURNAL OF AFRICA • Vol 22, No 3, May/June 2011
122
AFRICA
The history of the Pan-African Society of Cardiology
(PASCAR): the first 30 years, 1981–2011
DAVID A WATKINS, SAMUEL I OMOKHODION, BONGANI M MAYOSI
Abstract
The year 2011 marks the 30th anniversary of the found-
ing of the Pan-African Society of Cardiology (PASCAR).
Throughout its brief history, PASCAR has been integral to
improving the cardiovascular health of the people of Africa.
During the past three decades, many African countries have
been vulnerable to political and social turmoil, and PASCAR
itself has been repeatedly challenged to press on with its
mission, in spite of innumerable practical obstacles. This
article celebrates the hard work and dedication of PASCAR’s
founders and subsequent leaders, and challenges the present
and future generations to carry on the charge of furthering
the health of Africans.
Foundation
The idea of PASCAR was conceived by a small group of African
cardiologists during the late 1970s. At that time the World
Congress of Cardiology was orientated towards cardiovascu-
lar conditions that were affecting the populations of Europe
and North America. Many African cardiologists felt that they
neither benefited nor were able to make much of an impact at
these world meetings. In November 1979, Prof Ayodele Falase,
then president of the Nigerian Cardiac Society, called upon
the members of his Society to organise a continental meet-
ing and inaugurate what he termed a ‘Pan-African Congress
of Cardiology’. At the Nigerian Society’s meeting in Ibadan,
Nigeria the following year, an organising committee was formed
and funding was secured from pharmaceutical companies and
the World Health Organisation, with administrative assistance
from University College Hospital in Ibadan, Nigeria.
The first PASCAR congress was held in Badagry, Nigeria
in May 1981. This meeting was most remarkable in the diver-
sity of its participants. Over 120 clinicians and scientists from
15 African countries attended, and the event brought together
English- and French-speaking Africans, fostering understand-
ing between these historically separated groups. International
collaboration and cooperation began in an unprecedented way,
as cardiovascular workers were able to discuss their challenges,
successes and research discoveries, and exchange ideas as never
before. At the conclusion of the congress on 6 May 1981, the Pan
African Society of Cardiology was officially inaugurated.
Out of this inaugural meeting, the organisation set for itself
four goals: first, to prevent and treat cardiovascular disease in
Africa; second, to educate and train African healthcare profes-
sionals about cardiovascular disease; third, to educate layper-
sons about heart disease; and fourth, to invest in cardiovascular
research. The task ahead of PASCAR was monumental because
in those days, it was generally accepted among local ministries
of health that Africans had a ‘built-in protection’ against heart
disease and that hypertension and other cardiac risk factors
would never become epidemic on the continent.
Early achievements
Over the next decade, PASCAR congresses began to gain inter-
national attention. In April 1983, the second congress was held
in Nairobi, Kenya, with the aim to ‘take stock of different cardio-
vascular problems in the tropics’. The third congress, held jointly
with the Egyptian Society of Cardiology in 1985, highlighted
newer technologies such as echocardiography and cardiac condi-
tions affecting younger people, such as rheumatic heart disease.
During the same year, a very important meeting was convened in
Harare, Zimbabwe, and attended by over 50 scientists and clini-
cians from across the world. This meeting established a collabo-
rative research programme between American and African scien-
tists and was funded by the US National Heart Lung and Blood
Institute, the Association of Black Cardiologists (USA), and the
International Society of Hypertension among Blacks. Out of this
collaboration, many subsequent projects were seeded.
In March 1989, PASCAR convened for the fourth time and
developed a governing structure for the organisation, including
the creation of five regional bodies that would meet on a bien-
nial basis. Importantly, this was the first meeting to recognise
and declare hypertension as a major cause of morbidity and
mortality among Africans. Following the success of that event,
however, the next meeting (1991) had to be abandoned as it had
been scheduled in Ethiopia, which at that time was in the throes
of civil unrest.
In spite of the Ethiopian setback, the fifth PASCAR congress
proceeded as planned in Yaoundé, Cameroon in April 1993.
This particular meeting attracted an educational grant from
the Rockefeller Foundation (USA) and various pharmaceutical
companies and its theme was ‘preventative cardiology in Africa’.
Over 500 specialists attended, including representatives of the
American Heart Association, World Health Organisation, and
International Society and Federation of Cardiology (later, World
Heart Federation), making this the largest meeting to date.
Stagnation
During the mid-1990s the pan-African meetings stagnated, in
part due to political changes impacting on the organisation.
For instance, in 1996 the General Secretary of PASCAR was
named minister of health in Cote d’Ivoire. However advocacy
efforts and regional meetings still continued. PASCAR members
participated in the Organisation of African Unity conference of
African ministers of health in 1995 and played a key role in high-
lighting the growing burden of chronic disease on the continent.
In February 1997, a workshop on hypertension and echocardi-
ography was held inYaoundé, supported by prominent American
cardiologists such as Dr Richard Cooper, Dr Julian Haywood,
and Dr George Mensah. InAugust of the following year, prepara-
tions began for the sixth congress, which commenced in August
1999 in Cotonou, Benin, under the leadership of Dr Hippolyte
Agboton.
