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Dr. Stacy Davis, AHA Nashville Board President

The American Heart Association’s Go Red for Women movement released study findings last month that show women in the Nashville area are facing more than their fair share of heartache.

Looking at a number of parameters in the 200 most populous cities, which were then divided into three categories based on size, Nashville scored the absolute worst in the “mega metros” division. Whereas Minneapolis/St. Paul, Los Angeles, Denver and Washington D.C. were praised for their heart health in the category of metro areas with more than 1.45 million in population, Nashville was joined at the bottom by St. Louis, Detroit, Dallas, Las Vegas and Pittsburgh.

The low ranking is particularly alarming considering heart disease is the number one killer of women in America. Nationally, more women die of cardiovascular disease than the next five causes of death combined … including cancer. The American Heart Association (AHA) states nearly one-third of the female population in America suffers from some form of cardiovascular disease, and approximately one woman dies from heart disease every minute of the day.

The 22 factors considered in the ranking included rates of smoking, obesity, cardiac mortality and physical activity. Access to care, insurance coverage and the number of cardiologists per capita were also among the issues weighed by Sperling’s Best Places, the organization commissioned by Go Red For Women to do the study.

Despite the bad news, Dr. Stacy Davis, board president for AHA Nashville and a cardiologist with Saint Thomas Heart who practices at Baptist Hospital, said there is a silver lining.

She noted Nashville scored poorly when it came to our traditional Southern diet, high rates of smoking and low rates of physical activity but fared well in terms of access to care and coverage.

“The good news is we have plenty of insured patients and enough specialists to treat them, and the places where we did sub-optimally are preventable,” Davis pointed out. “Prevalence of smoking –– preventable; high blood pressure –– preventable; sedentary lifestyle –– changeable. They are malleable things … we can fix them.”

At the heart of the issue, Davis said is that women are so busy caring for their families that they forget to pay attention to their own needs.

“The headline should be ‘women need to be better caretakers of their own health,’” she stated.

She also called this study a “wakeup call” for Nashvillians and for physicians. With the information in hand, doctors should look at this as an opportunity to have frank discussions with their patients about lifestyle modifications. Women, Davis said, should ‘know their numbers.’ The “Know Your Numbers” campaign is a major initiative of Go Red for Women encouraging consumers to know the stats on their blood pressure, lipid profile and blood sugar.

Noting the irony, Davis added that within days of the study being released, Nashville Mayor Karl Dean and the Nashville Fire Department accepted Tennessee’s first-ever “Heart Ready” award from the AHA for the tremendous work the city is doing to improve survival rates from sudden cardiac arrest. The survival rate, which has doubled in the past year, is attributed to efforts by Chief Stephen Halford and Nashville firefighters to drive CPR education and place automated external defibrillators in public places.

Davis, who was very excited about the award and the city’s success in increasing survival rates from sudden cardiac arrest, said there was clearly a way to improve outcomes even further … and that’s by preventing heart attacks in the first place.

“If we could do as well with prevention, wouldn’t that be fantastic?” she asked. “We’d rather have them (patients) get to us in prevention mode rather than post-acute MI mode.”

To begin to chip away at Nashville’s unfortunate ranking, Davis encouraged women to go online to www.goredforwomen.org to learn more about cardiovascular disease, symptoms, heart-healthy recipes, lifestyle modifications and more. She also called on physicians to help build awareness among their patients and to be on the alert for early warning signs and risk factors for cardiovascular disease.


Most & Least Heart Friendly Mega Metros
In late May, the Go Red For Women movement of the American Heart Association released the findings of their recent heart health study. Results for the best and worst cities in the category of large metropolitan areas (more than 1.45 million in population) are as follows:

Most Heart Friendly Cities for Women
1. Minneapolis-St. Paul-Bloomington, MN
2. Washington-Arlington-Alexandria, DC
3. San Francisco-San Jose-Oakland, CA
4. Denver-Aurora, CO
5. Boston-Cambridge-Quincy, MA
6. Seattle-Tacoma-Bellevue, WA
7. Portland-Vancouver-Beaverton, OR
8. San Diego-Carlsbad-San Marcos, CA
9. Los Angeles-Long Beach-Santa Ana, CA
10. Phoenix-Mesa-Scottsdale, AZ

Least Heart Friendly Cities for Women
1. Nashville-Murfreesboro, TN
2. St. Louis, MO
3. Detroit-Warren-Livonia, MI
4. Pittsburgh, PA
5. Dallas-Fort Worth-Arlington, TX
6. Columbus, OH
7. Cincinnati-Middletown, OH
8. Las Vegas-Paradise, NV
9. Cleveland-Elyria-Mentor, OH
10. Indianapolis, IN



June 2008

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