Women and Heart Disease

You've got to understand risk if you want to stay healthy. Why do women fear breast cancer more than heart disease? As a group, women have a 4% chance of dying from breast cancer vs. a 38% chance of dying from heart disease. But because women are less likely than men to develop heart disease in their 40s, they (and their doctors) often assume they don't need to worry too much about cardiac problems.

So, the American Heart Association has come up with new guidelines on preventing heart disease that emphasize a woman's lifetime risk. The idea is for women to understand their real risks better and, hopefully, to motivate them to exercise more and adopt a healthier diet. Indeed, there's probably more you can do to prevent heart disease than to prevent breast cancer anyway.