The annual health rankings of U.S. counties was released Monday by the University of Wisconsin Population Health Institute.
Not surprisingly, Dallas County did not measure up too well, placing only 67th out of 232 Texas counties that made the annual listing.
Collin County, however, ranked second in the state, behind only Williamson County. Denton County ranked third, and Rockwall County ranked fourth.
The data came from 2010.
Dallas County’s low ranking took into account a wide variety of healthy and unhealthy factors, including higher-than-expected mortality and a variety of morbidity factors.
Mortality was defined as having too many premature deaths, which include any death before age 75.
Morbidity measures was measured by the percentage of the local population that reported themselves as being in poor to fair health. That included 17 percent of the people who live here, compared to 10 percent of those surveyed nationwide.
Low birthweight also was a factor, which included 8.3 percent of Dallas County births compared to 6 percent of births nationally.
Various other health behaviors also pulled down Dallas County’s rating to 156 for “health factors” mmeasured in the state, including such habits as adult smoking, adult obesity and excessive drinking.
However, the only good news came in the clinical area, which placed Dallas County as 36th statewide. That ranking related to having more primary-care doctors here than in other parts of the state. The estimate was one such doctor per 1,585 residents of Dallas County compared to 1 for 1,766 residents statewide. The national level is 1 per 1,067 population.
0 comments:
Post a Comment