Street Peeper Zimbabwe Street Peeper September 2017 | Page 53

Hypertension
"Heart disease is the lead-
ing killer of women," says
Dr. Goldberg, "and only 1 in
5 women realizes she is at
risk." One chief risk factor
is hypertension, a.k.a. high
blood pressure, and before
age 55, men are likelier to
have it. "But as women get
older," she says, "their
blood pressure goes up be-
cause their blood vessels
aren’t as flexible."
people develop Alzheimer’s
more, and women live
longer—medical experts
are still trying to piece to-
gether the gender diver-
gence. many autoimmune diseases
have a genetic component,
"We don’t really under-
stand the reason why
women are disproportion-
ately affect
Migraines
Mysterious, awful head-
aches that can put a person
out of commission for days
at a time, migraines af-
fect three women for every
one man, and up to a quar-
ter of all women, period.
By age 65, women overtake Hormonal changes are
men. Ten years later, the
known to be involved,
gulf is sizable: About 4 of 5 though the exact cause of
U.S. women are hyperten- the pain hasn’t been pin-
sive, versus 2 of 3 men.
pointed yet. "
While genetics play a role
in your odds of developing Different people with mi-
the condition, your physical graines have different trig-
wellbeing is a big determi- gers," says Dr. Goldberg. "It
nant. "There are things that could be perfume, change
improve blood vessel flexi- in humidity, [or even] food,
bility, such as eating right like red wine."
and exercising," says Dr.
Take heart, though:
Goldberg. The key is to
"Sometimes women are
start early:
more likely to get their mi-
graines around their men-
Alzheimer's Disease
strual periods
Alzheimer's Disease is a
double whammy for
Autoimmune Diseases
women. Not only havestud- "Autoimmune Diseases" is
ies found that our health
an umbrella term for a
declines faster, but our
group of over 100 chronic
chances of developing AD illnesses including rheuma-
are much higher than
toid arthritis, multiple scle-
men—almost 2 to 1. In fact, rosis, and Graves’ Disease,
in 2013, Alzheimer’s killed in which the body essen-
around 59,000 women
tially turns on itself.
compared to about 26,000 About 75 percent of people
men.
affected are women, though
for some illnesses, like lu-
While some of it has to do pus, the numbers are more
with life expectancy—older like 90 percent. And while ted," says Dr. Goldberg.
Beyond the often debilitat-
ing symptoms associated
with each respective condi-
tion, autoimmune diseases
have another nefarious side
effect: "Those inflamma-
tory conditions also in-
crease a women’s risk for
heart disease."
Gallstones
Gallstones are hard parti-
cles that become stuck in
the gall bladder, a tiny or-
gan between your liver and
intestines. Pregnant
women and obese women
over 40 are particularly
prone to them—especially
if they’ve had hormone re-
placement therapy—and
almost half of all women
are expected to develop
gallstones by age 75, versus
just 20 percent of men.
Usually, you don’t even no-
tice a stone unless there’s
pain involved, at which
point you should see a doc-
tor. "If you have pain in the
right upper abdomen and
you have those characteris-
tics, you might need to get
evaluated, because gall-
stones can cause inflamma-
tion of the gallbladder,
which leads to infection,
and you can get seriously
ill,