In this article we discuss the portrayal of heart disease based on a content analysis of the highest circulating English-language magazines available in Canada and published in Canada or the United States in 1991, 1996, and 2001. It includes both manifest and latent content analysis. In terms of the manifest analysis, the findings indicate the dominance of the medical frame followed by lifestyle and social structural frames. The latent analysis reveals the following frames: (a) optimism about medicine; (b) medicine as "good" and, by contrast, the body as "bad"; (c) heart disease as an "attack"; (d) heart disease as an individual responsibility; (e) contradictory information; (f) male celebrity patients and doctors; and (g) prestigious medical doctors, journals, and institutions. The medicalized portrayal of heart disease as fear generating is considered. In addition, the lack of attention to social structural causation in contrast to current epidemiological findings is discussed.

Using a qualitative content analysis, this paper investigates the portrayal of heart disease among men and women in 75 articles of the 20 highest circulating mass print magazines in 1991, 1996 and 2001 available in Canada and published in the United States and Canada. The majority of articles were directed at men. Whether the article focused on men or women, the depiction of heart disease tended to be gendered. For men, heart disease was described as almost inevitable and as a badge of successful manhood. Its experience and treatment were portrayed as mechanical and aggressive, as well as the result of individual lifestyle choices that could be "fixed" by the individual himself. In comparison, women's heart disease was portrayed as something of which to be ashamed, especially since diagnosis conflicts with the role of "caregiver." Women were described as ignorant, emotional victims. Moreover, women's bodies were portrayed as pathological, especially after menopause. Practical and theoretical implications of the findings are discussed.

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