Expanding the evidence for health promotion: developing best practices for WISEWOMAN.

Implementing effective programs to prevent chronic disease holds the promise of reducing morbidity and mortality, reducing health disparities, and promoting health. Yet many programs have demonstrated success only in highly controlled research settings and few address the needs of low-income, uninsured, minority women. Well-Integrated Screening and Evaluation for Women Across the Nation (WISEWOMAN), a demonstration program funded by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), that provides chronic disease risk factor screening and lifestyle interventions for low-income, 40-64-year-old women is learning from our own successful programs but is also charting new territory.

Racial/ethnic disparities in coronary heart disease risk factors among WISEWOMAN enrollees.

Background: We used the baseline data collected for the Well-integrated Screening and Evaluation for Women Across the Nation (WISEWOMAN) participants to provide a snapshot of cardiovascular disease (CVD) risk on enrollment and to address racial/ethnic disparities in the following CVD risk factors: body mass index (BMI), systolic and diastolic blood pressure, high-density lipoprotein (HDL) and total cholesterol, diabetes and smoking prevalence, 10-year coronary heart disease (CHD) risk, and treatment and awareness of high cholesterol, hypertension, and diabetes.

Methods: We used linear regression analysis to (1) assess the presence of racial/ethnic disparities and test whether existing disparities can be explained by (2) differences in individual characteristics or by (3) differences in individual and community characteristics.

Results: Our results reveal a high degree of CVD risk among the WISEWOMAN participants and statistically significant racial/ethnic disparities in risk factors.