“Most permanent high altitude dwellers across the world living at 7,000 feet show excellent adaption to living at altitude. Existing literature suggests that adaption to altitude relates to duration living at altitude and genetics. Compared to other populations that live at altitude across the world, Rocky Mountain region inhabitants have lived at altitude for the shortest amount of time and are the least adapted. Little is known about the impact of living at altitude on health and wellness.” 

Really cool opportunity for Summit County residents to participate in a first of kind study on how high altitude living effects quality of life:

“We are the youngest population and looking at how high elevation effects your quality of life. We are looking for participants that are 18 years or older living within Summit County for six months or longer.” -Candy Elkin

Doctors at the High Altitude Research Center are seeking participants for their project and its super easy get involved.  They are looking for 3,000 people to fill out an online questioner that takes about 15 minutes to complete. If you would like to participate in the study please GO HERE:

The purpose of the research at HARC:

Medical researchers have questioned for years what kind of long-term effects living at high-altitude can have on the human body. The researchers at the High Altitude Research Center hope to answer a lot of those questions. The center, established at St. Anthony Summit Medical Center, is a collaboration between Centura Health, the Altitude Research Center, Division of Pulmonary Sciences and Critical Care Medicine, Department of Medicine, University of Colorado School of Medicine, and many other scientists to find out how living above 7,500 feet affects the health of its residents.

About HARC

Very little is known about the health impacts of living at high altitude. Most permanent high altitude populations have adapted to living at high altitude over thousands of years. Compared to other high altitude communities around the globe, Rocky Mountain inhabitants have lived at altitude for the shortest amount of time and are the least adapted. For this reason, our community reflects the perfect population for a living laboratory focused on discovering the effects of living at high altitude.

Studying the Effects of Altitude on the Human Body

The High Altitude Research Center will nurture the health of our community by serving as a living laboratory focused on discovering the effects of living at high altitude. Most permanent high altitude dwellers across the world living at 7,000 feet show excellent adaption to living at altitude. Existing literature suggests that adaption to altitude relates to duration living at altitude and genetics. Compared to other populations that live at altitude across the world, Rocky Mountain region inhabitants have lived at altitude for the shortest amount of time and are the least adapted. Little is known about the impact of living at altitude on health and wellness. High altitude hypertension, a condition that can lead to significant impairment of quality of life, affects between 5-23% of the world population but has never been studied thoroughly in Colorado Rocky communities where the diagnosis may be more common than in the general population. The seminal study at the High Altitude Research Center will seek to identify the prevalence of pulmonary hypertension in Summit County’s full time residents.

Our story

This motivated Johnson to reach out to other researchers around the globe, which gave birth to the idea of starting a long-term, large scale research project in Summit County, the only high-altitude population in the world that’s been established within the last two generations. There are some things commonly associated with either visiting or living at high altitude, such as sleep disturbances, and temporary or permanent lowering of oxygen levels, and increased blood pressure, for example.

“We don’t know what we don’t know, and there has never been a large population-based study anywhere in the world,” Denkinger explains.

But beyond identifying baselines of demographics as well as medical histories and conditions, Denkinger insists the team wants to be able to provide information to everyone in this environment so they can better manage their health.

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