Healthline Observes National Wear Red Day

It's here! National Wear Red Day and of course the folks here at Healthline seized the opportunity to observe it, check out our photographs. The "red brigade" (thanks Robin for coining the phrase) came out in full force and it was quite funny to hear stories about what a challenge it was for some of us to find something red in our closets to wear.

On a more serious note though here are the facts: contrary to popular belief, cancer is not the number one killer of women, it's heart disease and less than half of all women are aware of this. In actuality, heart disease accounts for 32% of deaths in American women per year. 1 in 25 women die from breast cancer while 1 in 3 women die from heart disease and 63% of the women who suddenly die from heart disease had no previous evidence of it. In women under 45, smoking is the most prevalent and preventable cause of heart disease. Last but not least, most heart disease is quite often preventable.

Okay, the future isn't bleak so what can you do? If you're a woman here is a list of 10 questions to ask your doctor and here are some tips for heart health. Some of the goals may be more achievable if you use the buddy system - ask one or two of your smoking buddies to quit as well and hold each other accountable. Get a buy one get one free gym membership with a friend...and actually use it. Go out of your way to be a little more physically active than you otherwise would by using the staircase instead of the escalator or elevator (depending of course on how high up you have to go).

It isn't always easy to make that shift into healthy living but it is worth the effort and you can at least laugh along the way. Check out Carrie's (another one of our bloggers) adventures in smoking cessation in our Freedom from Smoking blog. For exercise and fitness tips check out The Fitness Fixer and if you need a guide to healthy nutrition then check out The Diet Dish too!

Oh yeah, and if you wore red today feel free to give us a holla' and let us know how it went!

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