Churchill County is the 11th healthiest of Nevada’s 17 counties, according to a recent Health Factors rating that compares a collection of health factors.
The overall ranking is based on two types of measures: how long people live and how healthy people feel.
The factors assessed are the rate of death before age 75; percent of people who report being in poor or fair health; numbers of days people reported being in poor physical and mental health; and the rate of low-birthweight babies.
The top spot went to Lincoln County with Pershing in second.
Washoe is the fourth healthiest, Storey 11th, Carson 12th and Lyon 14th. Mineral County placed last.
Researchers also studied other factors — health behaviors, clinical care, environmental, social and economic — although they weren’t used to determine overall rank.
Churchill scored 10th for health behaviors, noting smoking is 1 percent higher than the state average. Obesity and excessive drinking also rank high with excessive drinking 3 percent higher than the state’s percentage. It also did not score well for clinical care factors such as number of preventable hospital stays or the ratio of doctors or dentists to the general population. For example, the ratio of patients seeing a primary care doctor is 1,850:1
It scored 11th in social and economic factors with a below high school graduation average but 11th in environmental factors, which considered air pollution, drinking water violations and other factors.
To see how each county scored, go to www.countyhealthrankings.com.