Women's Health 2011: A Year in Review

Review some of the contributions CDC made to women's health in 2011.

In 2011, CDC made numerous contributions to better understand, address, improve, and promote the health, safety, and quality of life of women, at all stages of life.

• Cooperative Agreement to Support Young Women Diagnosed with Breast Cancer
  CDC awarded funding to seven organizations for a new three-year cooperative agreement, "Developing support and educational awareness for young (<45 years of age) breast cancer survivors in the United States," as part of a broader effort to support breast cancer awareness in young women.
• Million Hearts™: Preventing a Million Heart Attacks and Strokes in Five Years
  Cardiovascular disease - heart disease and stroke - is the leading killer of women. To reduce stroke and heart attacks across the nation, the recently launched Million Hearts initiative is working to promote heart-healthy lifestyles and to improve patient care by focusing on the "ABCS" of clinical prevention: Aspirin for people at risk, Blood pressure control, Cholesterol management, and Smoking cessation.
• CDC Announces New Effort to Boost Number of Baby-Friendly Hospitals
  CDC has awarded nearly $6 million over three years to the National Initiative for Children's Healthcare Quality to help hospitals nationwide make quality improvements to maternity care to better support mothers and babies to be able to breastfeed.
• CDC Launches Effort to Protect Cancer Patients from Infections
  CDC's Preventing Infections in Cancer Patients program is a comprehensive initiative focusing on providing information, action steps, and tools for patients, their families, and their health care providers to reduce the risk of life-threatening infections during chemotherapy treatment.
• National Intimate Partner and Sexual Violence Survey (NISVS)
  This survey provides baseline data that will be used to track trends in sexual violence, stalking and intimate partner violence. On average, 24 people per minute are victims of rape, physical violence, or stalking by an intimate partner in the United States, based on a survey conducted in 2010. More than 1 million women are raped in a year and over 6 million women and men are victims of stalking in a year. These findings emphasize that sexual violence, stalking, and intimate partner violence are important and widespread public health problems in the United States.
• Maternal and Infant Outcomes Among Severely Ill Pregnant and Postpartum Women with 2009 Pandemic Influenza A (H1N1) - United States, April 2009-August 2010
  Among women who delivered while hospitalized for influenza, 63.6% delivered preterm or very preterm and 43.8% delivered low birth weight infants compared with U.S. averages of 12.3% for preterm birth and 8.2% for low birth weight.
• A Public Health Approach for Advancing Sexual Health in the United States: Rationale and Options for Implementation [PDF-7.86MB]
  On April 28–29, 2010, CDC held a consultation with 67 experts in the field of sexual health to discuss the elements of the green paper and to further explore the rationale, vision, and priority actions for a public health approach to advance sexual health in the United States. This report is a summary of the meeting's proceedings.
• Vital Signs: Preventing Teen Pregnancy in the U.S.
  Prevention efforts work by teaching teens how and why to delay starting sex and steps that they need to take if they become sexually active.
• Sexual Behavior, Sexual Attraction, and Sexual Identity in the United States: Data from the 2006-2008 National Survey of Family Growth (NSFG) [PDF-603KB]
  Sexual behaviors among males and females 15-44 years of age, based on the 2006-2008 NSFG, were generally similar to those reported based on the 2002 NSFG.
• Data to Action
  New data and analysis tools – including Sortable Stats, Policy Implementation Analyses and Burden Assessments are available for teen pregnancy and other issues– and serve as resources in the promotion of policy, system and environmental changes to improve health.
• Smoking Early in Pregnancy Raises Risk of Heart Defects in Infants
  Maternal cigarette smoking in the first trimester was associated with a 20 to 70 percent greater likelihood that a baby would be born with certain types of congenital heart defects, according to a CDC study. The study is in the Feb. 28 issue of the journal Pediatrics.
• Nail Technicians' Health and Workplace Exposure Control
  Nail salon employees are potentially exposed to dozens of chemicals including acrylates, solvents, and biocides as dusts or vapors.
• Women at High Risk for Diabetes, Access and Quality of Health Care, 2003-2006
  This report uses national datasets to provide information about the quality of care among women at high risk for diagnosed diabetes compared with women not at high risk. (CDC and Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality report)

More Information

• A Timeline of CDC/ATSDR Contributions to Women's Health
• CDC Women's Health
• Healthy Living Calendars