By Amy Norton, Medical Tribune News Service
Middle-aged and older women often misjudge their risk for
developing some of the major diseases that strike American women,
according to a report.
In fact, researchers reported in the July issue of Health
Psychology, women 40 and older may know more about men's health
risks than their own.
In a survey of 200 women ages 41 to 95, Stanford University
School of Medicine researchers found that women frequently
underestimate their risk for developing and dying from heart
disease. Only 34 percent of women 65 and older knew that heart
disease is the leading cause of death among American women their
age. In contrast, 76 percent of all respondents correctly
identified heart disease as the leading cause of death among
middle-aged men.
``Women were quite accurate in evaluating men's risk,'' said
psychologist Sara Wilcox, the study's lead author, who is now at
Wake Forest University School of Medicine in Winston-Salem, N.C.
``Coronary heart disease,'' she added, ``has traditionally been
viewed as a man's disease.''
Further, the California researchers found that the women tended
to overestimate the risk of dying from breast cancer and
underestimate the risk of dying from lung or colon cancer.
Without accurate knowledge of these health risks, women may
fail, for example, to get colon-cancer screening or to make
lifestyle changes that reduce heart-disease risk, Wilcox noted.
Major risk factors for heart disease that can be controlled through
lifestyle changes or medication include high cholesterol, high
blood pressure and smoking.
``Knowledge [of health risks] helps women in medical
decision-making,'' she said.
``We're very aware that women tend to overestimate their risk
for breast cancer and underestimate their risk for heart disease,''
said Dr. Debbie Saslow, director of breast and cervical cancers at
the American Cancer Society in Atlanta. Not as much, she added, has
been known about women's perceptions of lung and colon cancers, the
leading and second-leading causes of cancer death in the United
States.
In the Stanford survey, women were asked whether cancer, heart
disease, accidents or stroke was the leading cause of death for
various age and gender groups. They also had to choose which form
of cancer accounted for the most deaths among women of various
ages.
Many women, 64 percent, knew that breast cancer is the leading
cause of cancer death among women ages 45 to 54, according to the
report. But many incorrectly believed breast cancer is the No. 1
killer of older women. For example, 58 percent picked breast cancer
as the leading cause of cancer death among women ages 55 to 64; 85
percent did not know that lung cancer causes the most cancer deaths
among women this age. And 68 percent did not know that colon cancer
is the deadliest cancer among women 75 and older.
``It is clear that people don't have good perceptions of their
health risks as they age,'' Saslow said. It's likely, according to
Saslow, that middle-aged and older men also give relatively little
consideration to colon cancer. Experts recommend that adults 50 and
older get yearly screening for the disease.
But only 37 percent of colon-cancer cases in this country are
detected before the cancer spreads, when the five-year survival
rate is 91 percent, Saslow said.
Despite the fact that respondents tended to overestimate
breast-cancer mortality, Wilcox pointed out, women 65 and older
often failed to recognize that breast-cancer risk increases with
age. Previous research has shown that older women frequently
believe they're less likely than middle-aged women to develop
breast cancer.
``We know that mammogram rates are lower among women older than
65,'' Saslow said. ``Probably the biggest reason is that their
doctors aren't recommending it.''
Even some doctors, she contended, don't recognize that
breast-cancer risk goes up with age.
The overall message of the Stanford study, Saslow said, is that
older people can cut their risk for a wide range of diseases
through exercise, good nutrition and keeping up with cancer
screening.
