Good Hearted Towns
New study ranks cities according to heart health
There are probably plenty of good-hearted people in your city, but is your city good for your heart? The American Heart Association's "Go Red For Women" movement has released a study revealing the nation's 10 most - and least - heart friendly cities for women. Minneapolis-St. Paul took the title of "Most Heart Friendly City For Women" while Nashville was named the least heart-friendly.
But even if your city finished at the bottom of the rankings, experts say there are still steps you can take to avoid heart disease, which is the number one killer of women in the U.S. each year.
"Actually the mortality rate for women is higher than for men," says Dr. Mary Ann Bauman, a national spokesperson for the American Heart Association, Dallas. "About 40,000 women die each year from breast cancer. That's ten times less than heart disease. They would not miss their mammograms, but they don't pay attention to their cholesterol and their blood pressure. They don't take time to exercise and aren't eating healthy. All of these are risk factors."
"We looked at more than 20 different factors altogether," says Bert Sperling, founder of Sperling's Best Places, which conducted the study. "Minneapolis had the lowest mortality rate from heart disease for women of all the major metro areas in our study. And it had the highest rate of women getting regular exercise, the lowest rate of diabetes, scored very well in the diagnosis of hypertension and results were in the top among women with access to health care. It also had a lower proportion of fast food restaurants per capita."
Rounding out the top ten most heart-friendly cities for women were:
2) Washington, D.C.
3) San Francisco, Calif.
4) Denver, Colo.
5) Boston, Mass.
6) Seattle, Wash.
7) Portland, Ore.
8) San Diego, Calif.
9) Los Angeles, Calif.
10) Phoenix, Ariz.
The ten least heart-friendly cities for women were:
10) Indianapolis, Ind.
9) Cleveland, Ohio
8) Las Vegas, Nev.
7) Cincinnati, Ohio
6) Columbus, Ohio
5) Dallas-Fort Worth, Texas
4) Pittsburgh, Pa.
3) Detroit, Mich.
2) St. Louis, Mo.
1) Nashville, Tenn.
According to Sperling, Nashville's bottom ranking resulted from a variety of factors, including high cardiac mortality, very few commuters who biked or walked and a high rate of smoking.
But living in a heart-friendly city is no guarantee that you will be free of heart disease, either.
"You can have terrible heart heath in a heart-healthy city and wonderful health in a non-heart healthy city," Bauman says. "For individuals, what we are trying to make women realize is that they have to take this into their own hands."
Bauman suggests these four steps: Get tested for hypertension and high cholesterol, stop smoking, exercise more and eat smarter.
"You may be able to feel when your blood pressure is sky high, but you are not going to feel when your blood pressure is 145 over 92, which is hypertension," Bauman says. "Running that pressure for a long time is going to wear and tear the blood vessels. Hypertension can lead to heart attack, stroke and kidney failure. High cholesterol promotes the hardening of arteries, which blocks them."
While quitting smoking may be obvious, some facts about exercise may not.
"We know that for every one hour of exercise, you get two extra hours of life, considering you are doing it regularly," Bauman says. "The ideal is daily for an hour, but the minimum is four times a week. You can park farther away from the elevator and take the steps. It all counts. The American Heart Association says your goal is 10,000 steps a day."
It's also vital to remember that eating smarter does not mean depriving yourself.
"The simple stuff is eating more fruits and vegetables, fish and chicken," Bauman says. "If you do have beef, eat lean beef. You do have to be careful what you eat and you do have to consider portions and calories. And not eating fast foods. Fast foods need to be a treat, not a routine. A steady diet of fast foods, in susceptible people, can be very damaging."
For more information, visit the Go Red For Women Web site at www.goredforwomen.org.
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