HEALTH REPORT - Heart Disease in Women

HEALTH REPORT - Heart Disease in Women
By Jerilyn Watson

Broadcast: Wednesday, February 18, 2004

This is Phoebe Zimmermann with the VOA Special English Health Report.

Studies show that many American women believe breast cancer is the biggest threat to their health. But more than ten times as many women die of cardiovascular diseases. These are diseases of the heart and blood vessels¹. Heart attacks and strokes are the leading killer² of both men and women.

Breast cancer kills about forty-thousand women in the United States each year. But heart attacks and strokes kill about five-hundred-thousand. In fact, fifteen percent more women than men die of cardiovascular disease. Yet many people still think of it mainly affecting men.

 
Graphic³ Image
The American Heart Association has new guidelines to help prevent heart attacks and strokes in women. It published the guidelines in Circulation: the Journal of the American Heart Association.

For example, the guidelines urge women not to use hormone⁴ replacement⁵ therapy as a way to protect the heart. Hormone replacement is for women past the time when they can have children. But recent studies have shown that it may do more harm than good.

The guidelines also urge women to know their risk of heart attack or heart disease. They suggest that a woman talk to her doctor about this beginning as young as the age of twenty.

The heart association Web site has information that can help people measure their level of risk. The address is americanheart-dot-o-r-g.

Users answer some questions. They enter their age and whether or not they smoke. They need to know the level of cholesterol⁶ in their blood. And they need to know their blood pressure.

A total score below ten percent is considered low risk. This means that a woman has less than a ten percent chance of a heart attack in the next ten years. The next level of ten to twenty percent is considered intermediate risk. More than twenty percent is high risk.

The heart association says those at high risk should ask their doctor for medicine that lowers cholesterol. Women are also urged to ask for treatment if their blood pressure is one-hundred-forty over ninety or higher.

The guidelines say women at intermediate or high risk should consider taking an aspirin⁷ each day. Aspirin may reduce the risk of a heart attack.

Again, the Web site is americanheart.org. Americanheart is all one word.

This VOA Special English Health Report was written by Jerilyn Watson. This is Phoebe Zimmermann.

1 vessels   

n.血管( vessel的名词复数 )；船；容器；（具有特殊品质或接受特殊品质的）人

参考例句：

• The river is navigable by vessels of up to 90 tons. 90 吨以下的船只可以从这条河通过。 来自《简明英汉词典》
• All modern vessels of any size are fitted with radar installations. 所有现代化船只都有雷达装置。 来自《现代汉英综合大词典》

2 killer   

n.杀人者，杀人犯，杀手，屠杀者

参考例句：

• Heart attacks have become Britain's No.1 killer disease.心脏病已成为英国的头号致命疾病。
• The bulk of the evidence points to him as her killer.大量证据证明是他杀死她的。

3 graphic   

adj.生动的，形象的，绘画的，文字的，图表的

参考例句：

• The book gave a graphic description of the war.这本书生动地描述了战争的情况。
• Distinguish important text items in lists with graphic icons.用图标来区分重要的文本项。

4 hormone   

n.荷尔蒙，激素，内分泌

参考例句：

• Hormone implants are used as growth boosters.激素植入物被用作生长辅助剂。
• This hormone interacts closely with other hormones in the body.这种荷尔蒙与体內其他荷尔蒙紧密地相互作用。

5 replacement   

n.取代，替换，交换；替代品，代用品

参考例句：

• We are hard put to find a replacement for our assistant.我们很难找到一个人来代替我们的助手。
• They put all the students through the replacement examination.他们让所有的学生参加分班考试。

6 cholesterol   

n.（U）胆固醇

参考例句：

• There is cholesterol in the cell of body.人体细胞里有胆固醇。
• They are determining the serum-protein and cholesterol levels.他们正在测定血清蛋白和胆固醇的浓度。

7 aspirin   

n.阿司匹林

参考例句：

• The aspirin seems to quiet the headache.阿司匹林似乎使头痛减轻了。
• She went into a chemist's and bought some aspirin.她进了一家药店，买了些阿司匹林。