High Cholesterol in San Diego County

A short analysis of high cholesterol prevalence and grocery store access

Christian Hicks

This Story Map briefly examines southern San Diego County census tracts to determine if there is a clear association between prevalence of high cholesterol and the number of nearby grocery stores.

Neighborhoods with the highest prevalence of high cholesterol include:

  • La Jolla
  • University City
  • El Cajon
  • Midway District

Access to grocery stores is important in maintaining a healthy diet and keeping bad cholesterol levels low. The map below examines the number of grocery stores inside and within a mile of these same census tracts.

Many of the neighborhoods mentioned above have relatively low counts of grocery stores within their census tract boundaries.

A look into this association is below.

An unadjusted linear regression model shows that each grocery store decreases the prevalence of high cholesterol for the residing census tract by 0.5%. Though with an R-square of 0.02, the predicting strength of this model is rather weak.

Data Sources

High cholesterol prevalence

CDC PLACES: Local Data for Better Health

Grocery store locations

ArcGIS Community Analyst

An unadjusted linear regression model shows that each grocery store decreases the prevalence of high cholesterol for the residing census tract by 0.5%. Though with an R-square of 0.02, the predicting strength of this model is rather weak.