"Cardiovascular Disease is a group of diseases that include major categories: disease of the heart and cerebrovascular disease (primarily stroke)" (Alexander, LaRosa Bader, Garfield & Alexander, 2010). It is the leading cause of death for women with any ethnic group.
Unfortunately, according to Health Care for Women International, (2005), lone mother are at an increased risk for cardiovascular disease than married mothers. Several factors for heart disease include social status, race, decreased financial status, number of children and being single parents apparently, have more negative effects on a woman health.
Lone mothers are more likely to use Medicad, food stamps and not have enough to eat. Lone mothers are also more likely to be frowned upon in society for having children and not being married. The stress of such views may cause undo stress to plague lone mothers. With this stress, lone mothers are more likely to overeat, smoke and have an increased consumption of alcohol (WCWI, 2005). Because of such habits and behaviors, more lone mothers have reported twice the rate of arthritis, diabetes, hypertension, and 3.5 times more likely to be very obese (WCWI, 2005). However, lone mother were more likely to be more active than partnered mothers.
After reviewing the information regarding women and CVD, it is appalling to know women in general whether married or unwed are at risk for a disease that is the leading cause of death among women. It appears our hearts are suffering greatly due to our gender. We are at risk for having silent heart attacks and doctors are less likely to take precautions for our heart health than they are of men's heart health. It is apparent that when we say our hearts are broken, we literally mean it.
Women, we owe ourselves the pleasure of taking care of our hearts whether married or unmarried. With diet, exercise and having close knit relationships with our families and sisterhood, we may be able to withstand our hearts being stressed. We must become a united front against heart disease and win the battle by taking care of or hearts.
Alexander, L.L., LaRosa, J. H., Bader, H., Garfield, S., & Alexander, W.J. (2010). Understanding
and preventing cardiovascular disease and cancer. In S. Goldberg, A. L. Bloom &
K. Hover (5th ed.)(Eds.),New Dimensions in Women's Health(pp. 264-307).
Sudbury, MA: Jones and Bartlett.
Health Care for Women International. (2005). Lone mothers are at higher risk for
cardiovascular disease compared with partnered mothers. Data from national health and
nutrition examination survey III (NHANSES III)(WCW 26(7) Publication No. 67611).
doi: 10.1080/07399330591004845
Hello Betryse,
ReplyDeleteI like your catchy title to your blog. I also agree with you that it should not matter if a women is single or married, all women should be taking proper care of their hearts. I also thought your findings were interesting on how single women are more likely to stay active than women who are wed but how they are more likely to smoke, have diabetes, hypertension, etc. However, whatever the health risks for women who are wed or single I do agree with you that they should being doing more to ensure their health with diet, exercise, having family support, as well as having meaningful relationships. Thank you for sharing your findings with me.
- Brittany LeBron