“Wear Red” Day

Posted: Feb. 1, 2005

Friday, February 4, 2005, is National Wear Red Day — a day when Americans nationwide will take women’s health to heart by wearing red to show their support for women’s heart disease awareness.

More women die of heart disease than all cancers combined, yet less than half of women know that heart disease is their biggest health threat. Most women fail to make the connection between the risk factors for heart disease and their personal risk of developing it.

The Heart Truth is a national awareness campaign to alert women about their risk for heart disease and motivate them to take steps to lower their risk. The campaign is sponsored by the National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute and the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services.

Heart disease awareness
Surveys show that the campaign is alerting women to their heart disease risk, but misconceptions still remain.

According to a 2003 American Heart Association survey, 46 percent of American women know that heart disease is the leading killer of women. In 2000, 34 percent knew and, in 1997, 30 percent knew.

But the new survey also found that, despite the increase in awareness, only 13 percent of women believe heart disease is their chief health threat — 35 percent of women put breast cancer as their top concern.

Other results show:

• Knowledge of the heart disease risk factors. Nearly all of the women knew the importance of being physically active, losing excess weight, not smoking, avoiding dietary cholesterol and reducing salt intake, but only about 30 percent knew their low-density lipoprotein (LDL, the "bad" cholesterol) or high-density lipoprotein (HDL, the "good" cholesterol) levels.
• Awareness of heart disease as a progressive disease. Ninety-five percent of women knew that it develops slowly over many years and can go undetected.
• Awareness of atypical symptoms of heart disease. Sixty-nine percent of those surveyed said women are more likely than men to have atypical or unusual symptoms during a heart attack.
• Confusion about hormone therapy. For example, 63 percent of women did not understand how hormone therapy affects a woman's health. Studies such as the Women's Health Initiative have found that estrogen plus progestin hormone therapy not only does not protect against heart disease but increases the risk of a heart attack during its first year of use.
• Misunderstandings about heart disease prevention and treatment. For example, 64 percent of women thought antioxidant vitamins E, C, and A could prevent heart disease — although studies show they have no benefit.

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