Baffled by gap

City, rural health divide

EVEN if all Australians met dietary and exercise guidelines, more regional residents would continue to die of heart diseases, according to new Deakin University research.

The Institute for Health Transformation study examined the most effective lifestyle changes to lower the number of deaths from heart disease - Australia’s biggest killer.

The lead author of the study, Dr Laura Alston, who is Colac-based, said the existing gap in people dying from heart disease in regional versus metropolitan areas was often blamed on individual lifestyle factors.

“If you live outside of a major city you’re 23 per cent more likely to die prematurely from heart disease,” Dr Alston said.

“This is often put down to the fact that the average person in a regional area has a poorer diet than their city cousins.

“But with our study we wanted to really drill down to see how much of a difference lifestyle factors could make in closing that gap, and we found that while they do go some way, an inequality remains.”

Dr Alston’s study showed that if all Australians met the same dietary and physical activity targets, 118 regional Australians would die from heart disease for every 96 deaths in a metropolitan city.

“So that gap would be reduced by 40 per cent, which is a significant effect and certainly shows the importance of lifestyle factors to reduce heart disease mortality across all population groups,” Dr Alston said.

“There needs to be more research into the factors behind this health gap.

“Our study didn’t look at why exactly it persisted, but it’s possible the issue may lie with isolation, stress, and access to healthcare, affordable medications, and GPs.”