Photo: Tracklan2 · CC0Lives run shorter around Picture Butte: 78.7 years, 2.8 below the typical Canadian town’s region
Self-rated health is ordinary for Alberta: 52% of the region’s adults say very good or excellent, the province 53%. For Picture Butte itself the measure is access, and it scores well: 0.7 km to the nearest hospital, where 3.7 km is typical. Picture Butte grades B for health.
What stands out about health in Picture Butte
No pharmacy close by
Picking up a prescription in Picture Butte takes a trip of 16 km on average to the nearest mapped pharmacy. Getting care ↓
More households under strain
With a situational-vulnerability score of 4.3 out of 5, Picture Butte sits in the index’s harder-pressed areas. The wider area ↓
Survey and life expectancy: the health region (Statistics Canada). Distances and deprivation: the town’s own areas.
Picture Butte grades B for health
Each input ranked against Canadian towns of 2,500 or more: the region’s four, the town’s distance to a hospital.
The region’s four figures and the town’s distance to a hospital are each ranked against Canadian towns of 2,500 or more, then averaged.
How the grade works
Health is graded as a regional score, labelled as such: very good or excellent self-rated health, chronic conditions (arthritis, diabetes and high blood pressure averaged) and smoking from the Canadian Community Health Survey, each age-standardised so an older region isn’t marked down for age alone, and life expectancy at birth, all for the health region. The residents’ average distance to a hospital is the one input measured for the town itself, so towns in one region can still differ.
From Picture Butte, a hospital is 0.7 km away on average
Measured from where the town’s residents live, so this part is Picture Butte’s own, not the region’s.
Picture Butte is closer in than the provincial norm of 3.1 km in Alberta, and than the typical Canadian town at 3.7 km. Few clinics are listed in Alberta, so the distance to one reads longer than it is.
Hospitals and clinics: Statistics Canada, Open Database of Healthcare Facilities. Pharmacies: © OpenStreetMap contributors (ODbL). Straight-line distances from each dissemination area, weighted by its 2021 population.
Life expectancy across the 5 health regions in Alberta
Regional life expectancy in Alberta, then the town’s place on the national deprivation index.
Life expectancy at birth by health region · 2022/2024
Ranked 4th of 5 in Alberta: the regions span 78.3 to 83.0 years at birth.
Canadian Index of Multiple Deprivation · national quintile, 1 least to 5 most deprived
The index is context and never graded: it describes Picture Butte’s own areas, averaged over residents, on each of its four dimensions.
Life expectancy: Statistics Canada table 13-10-0988, three-year estimate 2022/2024, by health region.
Deprivation predicts more: the region falls 1.2 years short of the trend
Compared region with region (102 health regions, each figure shared by all its towns); Picture Butte’s region is below the line.
Life expectancy drops as deprivation climbs across Canada’s 102 health regions (correlation −0.83); a score of 3.3 would suggest 79.9 years, but Picture Butte’s region stops at 78.7. Against the 10 regions with the nearest deprivation scores, all live longer; the middle of the group is 81.2 years. Its towns’ household income, about $83,000, sits above most regions’ while its life expectancy sits below; across regions it is the deprivation index, not income, that follows lives (income’s correlation: 0.14).
Life expectancy: Statistics Canada table 13-10-0988, 2022/2024, by health region. Deprivation: Canadian Index of Multiple Deprivation 2021 (situational vulnerability), averaged over each region’s towns by their residents; income: 2021 Census median household income, averaged the same way. The averages and the line are TownRatings calculations.
High blood pressure for 22% of adults in the region, diabetes for 9.3%
What the survey finds on conditions, weight and habits for the region, the province as the tick.
Conditions and weight · 2023/2024
Habits · 2023/2024
Self-reported obesity, 39%, tops Alberta (32%).
Canadian Community Health Survey 2023/2024 (table 13-10-0972), as published, not adjusted for age; obesity from reported height and weight. The anxiety disorder figure is the 2021/2022 estimate: Statistics Canada found the latest too unreliable to publish here.
About as many rate their health highly here as in Alberta: 53% and 54%
How adults in the health region answered the survey, not adjusted for age; the tick marks the province.
Share of adults, as answered · 2023/2024
Mental health is no outlier: 53% say very good or excellent (Alberta: 52%) and 22% live with stressful days.
Canadian Community Health Survey 2023/2024 (Statistics Canada table 13-10-0972), adults 18 and over, as published.
Health in the places around Picture Butte
Nearby places: distance to a hospital and each one’s regional figures. Tap a town for its health page.
| Town | Hospital | Very good health | Life exp. | Health |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Picture Butte | 0.7 km | 52% | 78.7 | B |
| Lethbridge County 3.8 km | 11 km | 52% | 78.7 | C+ |
| Coalhurst 18 km | 9.8 km | 52% | 78.7 | B− |
Only the hospital column is local here: Picture Butte and its neighbours share one health region’s survey. Lethbridge County is the furthest from care, 11 km to Picture Butte’s 0.7 km.
What this data can and can’t tell you
- What counts as a hospital. Hospitals and clinics come from Statistics Canada’s facilities database, built from provincial lists of different dates, and a listed hospital may have no emergency department.
- Adjusted for age. Because older people report more illness, the grade uses age-standardised shares; the charts above show the unadjusted answers.
- Deprivation is context. None of the four deprivation scores enters the grade; they come from the 2021 index, which skips the territories.
- Regional figures. The survey figures and life expectancy are published for the health region, so every town in it shares them and only the distances are Picture Butte’s own.
- Who the survey asks. Not everyone is in the survey’s sample: reserves, the Canadian Forces, institutions and two northern Québec regions are left out.
- Distances are straight lines. A straight line from each neighbourhood’s centre to the nearest facility, weighted by who lives there, is shorter than any drive.
Questions about health in Picture Butte
What is the life expectancy in Picture Butte?
Life expectancy comes by health region: 80.6 for women, 76.8 for men around Picture Butte (2022/2024).
How is Picture Butte’s Health Grade worked out?
Canada’s grades haven’t been set, so Picture Butte has none yet; when they are, Health will set its region and its hospital distance against the typical Canadian town.
How far is Picture Butte from a hospital?
A pharmacy is 16 km from the average resident of Picture Butte, as the crow flies; clinic lists here are too thin to measure.
How healthy is Picture Butte?
Most of the region’s figures sit on the less healthy side of the typical Canadian town’s, though not all. Chronic conditions there average 19% across arthritis, diabetes and high blood pressure.
Sources: Statistics Canada, Canadian Community Health Survey 2023/2024 (13-10-0972) · Statistics Canada, life expectancy 2022/2024 (13-10-0988) · Statistics Canada, health regions 2023 (82-402-X) · Statistics Canada, Open Database of Healthcare Facilities · pharmacies © OpenStreetMap contributors (ODbL) · Statistics Canada, Canadian Index of Multiple Deprivation 2021. Under the Statistics Canada Open Licence.
Adapted from Statistics Canada (Census of Population 2021, population estimates 2025, 2021 census boundaries) under the Statistics Canada Open Licence; this does not constitute an endorsement by Statistics Canada. Neighbourhood names in some cities © OpenStreetMap contributors (ODbL).