The Rankings

North Dakota

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Strengths:

• Low violent crime rate
• High rate of high school graduation
• High immunization coverage
• Low levels of air pollution

Challenges:

• High prevalence of binge drinking
• High geographic disparity within the state

Highlights:

• In the past year, the rate of preventable hospitalizations decreased from 69.0 to 64.1 discharges per 1,000 Medicare enrollees.
• In the past year, the percentage of children in poverty increased from 14.4 percent to 16.1 percent of persons under age 18.
• In the past ten years, diabetes increased from 5.2 percent to 7.4 percent of adults. There are now 39,000 adults with diabetes in the state.
• In the past ten years, obesity increased from 20.4 percent to 27.9 percent of adults; now, there are 146,000 obese adults in North Dakota.
• While smoking has decreased from 23.2 percent to 17.4 percent of adults in the past ten years, 91,000 adults still smoke in the state.

Health Disparities:

In North Dakota, obesity is more prevalent among non-Hispanic American Indians at 43.5 percent than non-Hispanic whites at 27.4 percent and Hispanics at 37.7 percent. Diabetes also varies by race and ethnicity in the state; 14.7 percent of non-Hispanic American Indians have diabetes compared to 7.1 percent of non-Hispanic whites and 6.5 percent of Hispanics.

State Health Department Web Site: www.ndhealth.gov