Go west, young parents:

Get pregnant in Chicago and have the baby in Portland.

That's the advice from Fit Pregnancy magazine, which recently rated U.S. cities for parents.

Portland rates the top city in the U.S. for childbirth, based on factors like access to medical care, infant and maternal mortality rate, and number of low-weight births.

Minneapolis ranks second, followed by San Francisco, Seattle and Denver.

For parental amenities, Virginia Beach boasts the best parks and paths, and San Diego is tops for breast-feeding -- but Chicago offers the best fertility services.

Hispanic heart health

Heart disease and stroke are the leading cause of death among Hispanics.

Half of Mexican-American women, according to the Center for Disease Control, are obese, and more than half of Mexican-American women say they never do any exercise.

The American Heart Association also reports that Hispanic women's heart disease risk is comparable to non-Hispanic white women 10 years older.

ChicagoHealers.com recommends a diet heavy on fruits and vegetables plus regular exercise and stress relief.

Feel the burn

Some health clubs apparently burn more customers than calories.

Complaints to the Better Business Bureau about fitness clubs have increased 77 percent since 2003.

The most common complaints focus on membership fees, contracts, customer service and refunds.

Consumers should read the fine print on contracts, and make sure they're not overbilled.

Check out your gym's complaint record for free at www.chicago.bbb.org.

Fat chance:

Remember that study that claimed overweight people had a lower risk of dying from certain diseases than people who were normal weight?

Don't bet your life on it.

Nutrition Action, by the Center for Science in the Public Interest, reports that some of those people who were normal weight were already sick, which is why they weighed less and died at a faster rate.

If you want to live longer, work that gut and those guns.

A recent study found that older men with the biggest arms and smallest waists had the lowest risk of dying.

-- Robert McCoppin