Today is National Wear Red Day.
February 1st is National Wear Red Day throughout America. Forget your usual working suit and dig out that red dress, shirt or tie and put it on. Wear red to indicate your awareness that heart disease is the number one killer of women. And I’m not talking broken heart here. Believe it or not, you can recover from a broken heart (How to Get Over a Broken Heart).
I’m talking about coronary heart disease which usually develops over many years causing narrowing and blocking of the arteries. If undetected and untreated it can easily result in heart attack and death.
Here’s some scary statistics:
• Heart disease is the #1 killer of American women.
• One in every three women dies of heart disease. One in 30 dies of breast cancer.
• Women’s heart disease risk starts to rise in middle age.
• About 3 million American women have had a heart attack.
• Two-thirds of American women who have had a heart attack don’t make a full recovery.
• Nearly two-thirds of American women who die suddenly of a heart attack had no prior symptoms.
• Americans can lower their risk of heart disease by as much as 82 percent just by leading a healthy lifestyle.
• Awareness of heart disease as the leading cause of death has increased from 30 percent in 1997 to 46 percent in 2003.
• Only 20 percent of women consider heart disease to be their own greatest health risk.
Risk factors for heart disease are:
• Smoking
• High blood pressure
• High blood cholesterol
• Overweight/obesity
• Physical inactivity
• Diabetes
• Family history of early coronary heart disease
• Age (for women, 55 and older)
What you can do now to reduce the risk…
- stop smoking
- eat healthy
- exercise
- yearly checkups for women (and men) over the age of 40.
Tags: healthy living, heart attack, heart disease, Prevention
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POSTED IN: Event, Health, Heart Health, Medicine, Misc., Prevention
5 opinions for Today is National Wear Red Day.
Alicia Sparks, NAMI Affiliation Leader
Feb 1, 2008 at 4:21 pm
Hey Liz, what information do you have about certain supplements helping keep our hearts healthy? Such as flaxseed/fish oils and Omega-3 fatty acids? I’m currently “experimenting” with flaxseed oil for the Omega-3 fatty acids in hopes it will help treat depression/bipolar disorder. I’ve heard it also helps with heart health?
Marijke
Feb 1, 2008 at 7:17 pm
I have chest pain frequently and I’ve been checked out quite thoroughly, precisely because my mother has heart disease.
They didn’t find anything specific, despite an angiogram and a two day stay in ICU. Not Fun. The ultimate diagnosis was Cardiac syndrome X, which means that I will have chest pain from time to time, but not to worry about it. NOW, I worry about, if I have chest pain, is it the CSX, or is it something more serious!
Liz
Feb 1, 2008 at 10:47 pm
Hi Alicia,
check out Healthbolt’s post on heart health links to find out the answers to your questions - Liberty’s done a fine job researching links for you to follow.
i know that there is an awful lot of research on the omega 3 aand flaxseed fish oils benefiting not only the heart but also the brain (depression, bipolar, alzheimer’s etc). Don’t know of anyone myself who is taking it.
Would love to hear how it works for you. Let us know if your writing anything about this over at your blog.
cheers,
liz
Liz
Feb 1, 2008 at 10:51 pm
Hi Marijke,
Thanks for sharing. Sounds like you had a pretty stressful time with it. I always love it when health professionals say ‘not to worry about it.’ It’s so much easier said than done.
But what you did, especially with a family history, of getting it checked out is the best move. So often women in particular ignore chest pain, thinking it will go away. Not ever a good move!
Another point for women (and older persons) to realise is that a large percentage will not suffer chest pain when having a heart attack…instead they might just feel generally unwell and nauseated…
cheers,
liz
Alicia Sparks, NAMI Affiliation Leader
Feb 2, 2008 at 12:33 am
Thanks Liz, will do!
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