Causes And Differences Between Men And Women The Aging Process

Heart disease is the leading cause of death among women in the United States. It is estimated that one in four women die from heart disease every year. Women are at a higher risk for heart disease than men because of a lack of knowledge and information. Women often feel the need to care for others before themselves and neglect their own health needs. As mothers, and sisters, and daughters it is important to protect our health for those that depend on us. Heart disease is preventable through knowledge and awareness and taking precautionary steps.

Life expectancy is defined by Aldwin and Gilmer (2013) as “the average number of years a person in a particular cohort can expect to live. In the 1900, people did not die of heart disease or cancer, but from infectious diseases. Causes of death for many people began to change from infectious diseases to chronic diseases in the 1930s due to treatments for infections becoming available. Living longer may be good to some, however, for many people living longer may result in age-related disorders. “Chronic disease such as arthritis, diabetes, osteoporosis, hypertension, arteriosclerosis, congestive heart disease, and disorders have replaced the acute diseases of years ago. In general, chronic diseases are not curable, and the main goal of treatment is management of the illness to decrease its rate of progression and, therefore, limit disability (Aldwin and Gilmer, 2013). With this being said, many people are living a longer life, but have a decrease in quality of life due to age related complications that did not exists 100 years ago (Aldwin and Gilmer, 2013).

The elderly population is growing with 35 million people who are age 65 years or older and half are between the ages of 65 to 74 and the other half are over the age of 75. The population age 85 years or older are the fastest growing population (Dubow, 2017). In 1991 the Institute of Medicine (IOM) reported that 8 out of 10 people over the age of 60 had one or more chronic diseases or impairments which included arthritis, hypertension, hearing impairment, heart disease, cataracts, deformity or orthopedic impairment, chronic sinusitis,

example, women have a higher percentage of hypertension over the age of 65 years old,

Age is one of the non-modifiable risk factors. As we are getting older, the risk of stroke incidence will increase as it will doubled every following 10 years after the age of 55 years old (Norsa’adah, 2005). It has been reported in Heart Disease and Stroke Statistics 2013 from the American Heart Association (Go et al., 2013), uneven distribution of stroke burden was experienced by women from racial/ethnic minority backgrounds; the incident of stroke risk among black women was doubled the white women. Hispanic women experienced higher stroke risk factor

The first thing that comes to mind when talking about men’s health are the health issues exclusively faced by men, such as prostate cancer and erectile dysfunction. However, men are also known to predominantly experience not so gender-specific health conditions, for instance cardiovascular diseases and diabetes. It is the objective of Canadian Men’s Health Foundation (CMHF), a non-profit organization established in 2014, to raise social awareness on few of men’s major health risks and issues – blood pressure, erectile dysfunction, diabetes, depression, and stress – that can be prevented and treated with early diagnosis. CMHF hopes that through their information and lifestyle programs,

The World Heart Federation (2016) identifies older age as a risk factor for cardiovascular disease with the risk of stroke doubling every decade after hitting age 55. As far as gender, men have a greater risk of heart disease than pre-menopausal women, however, once women past menopause,

This paper will discuss the relationship between the aging process and key diseases associated with aging. Examples of aging-associated diseases include cancer, diabetes, cardiovascular disease, and neurodegenerative diseases (López-Otín, Blasco, Partridge, Serrano, & Kroemer, 2013, p. 1194). Of these, we will discuss in-depth recent studies that have linked aging with Alzheimer’s disease, cardiovascular disease, and diabetes. These diseases affect a significant proportion of the population over the age of 65 and place a considerable burden on the American health care system. Therefore, a better understanding of how they are related to aging and each other can result in the adoption of innovative treatments and declined risk for older adults.

Attention getter: Heart Disease is the leading cause of death in women in the United States. According to The Center for Disease Control (CDC), heart disease claimed more than 292,188 women’s’ lives in 2009, that’s 1 in every 4 female deaths. The National Coalition of Heart Disease states that “A woman dies every 34 seconds.”

Traditionally men are considered to be at high risk. However Hemingway et al reported that women have a similarly high incidence of angina when compared with men. Additionally women with stable angina have an increased long-term coronary mortality when compared with women from the general population (122, 124).

Crimmins, Hayward, Ueda Saito and Kim in there journal article give statistical data on heart disease and death in both women and men (2008). This article states “37 percent of men and 27 percent of women over the age 65 report having a heart condition” (Crimmins et al., 2008). Crimmins research addresses the many differences in men with coronary artery disease compared to women with coronary artery disease. The study noted that men have a higher mortality rate from heart disease than do women (Crimmins et al., 2008). This article also notes that “40-50 percent of postmenopausal women will develop heart disease” (Crimmins et al., 2008). Crimmins and colleges noted men develop heart disease 5 to 10 years earlier in life than do women ( 2008). Evidence suggests that women who are hospitalized for cardiovascular issues are less likely to “receive certain types of drugs and diagnostic and treatment procedures” (Crimmins et al., 2008). Low socio-economic status and poor educational levels also have a marked effect on men and women’s knowledge of cardiovascular disease and the timing of when they seek treatment (Hemingway, 2007).

The social security article has shown that a male that is aged 65 years has a lower life expectancy than women. https://www.ssa.gov/. This is shown by the statistic that I researched using the social security article; A 65 year old man has a life expectancy of 84.3 where as a women aged 65 has a life expectancy of 86.6. https://www.ssa.gov/. This may be because women develop health illnesses later than men in their life. http://content.time.com/. Research has proved this by the Time article stating that women develop cardiovascular disease when they are about 70 or 80 years old where as men develop these illnesses when they are 50 or 60 years old. http://content.time.com/. The delay in the disease may be because of their iron deficiency in comparison to men. http://content.time.com/. This iron deficiency is common in young women aged 20 or 30 in which the iron deficiency difference between the men and women is higher for women because of menstruation taking place in a women or it may be because of a women’s genetic inheritance. http://content.time.com/. A woman has two X chromosomes whereas a man has only one X chromosome. Instead of having two X

Although significant gains have been made against chronic diseases, it has presented a new challenge. Chronic diseases are a common burden of the aging often requiring continued healthcare. Cardiovascular disease and osteoporosis are two such chronic diseases common in the elderly.

Table 6 shows the patterns of chronic disease in elderly persons crossed by gender. By reviewing the documents of the study sample, the most prevalent (34.5%) chronic disease was arthritis, which was more prevalent among females compared with males (43.2% vs. 23.4%). The second prevalent chronic disease was eye problem (14.2%) and female had a high percentage as compared with male (16.8% vs. 11.0%). The third prevalent chronic disease was bronchial asthma (10.9%) and there was no appreciable difference between the genders (10.3% vs. 10.9%). The prevalence of diagnosed hypertension was reported in 9.7% of the total study population. Among the interviewed, 5.5% reported diabetes mellitus. Other chronic health problems were chronic peptic ulcer

Chronic disease and conditions are usually defined as those diseases which last for more than six months and which have a severe effect on the life of the individuals (Chronic Conditions and Injury, para.1). While chronic diseases can affect people of all ages and demographics, these types of diseases are very often found in the elderly. Chronic disease are also characterized by "…multiple risk factors, long latency periods, a prolonged course of illness and functional impairment or disability" (Key indicators of progress for chronic disease and associated determinants, 2011, p. 1). Chronic disease is also found to be more prevalent in the ageing demographic of most countries.