Strokes have tripled in recent years among middle-aged women in the U.S., an alarming trend doctors blame on the obesity epidemic. Nearly 2 percent of women ages 35 to 54 reported suffering a stroke in the most recent federal health survey, from 1999 to 2004. Only about half a percent did in the previous survey, from 1988 to 1994.
talk about stroke
The percentage is small because most strokes occur in older people. But the sudden spike in middle age and the reasons behind it are ominous, doctors said in research presented Wednesday at a medical conference.
It happened even though more women in the recent survey were on medicines to control their cholesterol and blood pressure ¡ª steps that lower the risk of stroke.
Women's waistlines are nearly two inches bigger than they were a decade earlier, and that bulge corresponds with the increase in strokes, researchers said.
In addition, women's average body mass index, a commonly used measure of obesity, rose from 27 in the earlier survey to 29. They also had higher blood sugar levels.
No other traditional risk factors like smoking, heart disease or diabetes changed enough between the two surveys to account for the increase in strokes.
Men traditionally have had a greater risk of stroke than women, and "women start catching up to men five or 10 years after menopause," said Dr. Philip Gorelick, neurology chief at the University of Illinois in Chicago and chairman of the stroke conference.
The new research means "we need to redefine our textbooks about stroke in women," because they may now be more at risk in middle age than men.
Obesity "sets the stage for all the other risk factors to come in" like diabetes and heart disease, Gorelick added.
In other news at the conference, two studies found that stroke patients were more likely to die if they went to hospitals on nights or weekends, echoing other recent studies that found similar risks for heart attack and surgery patients.
