Heart Disease Facts: What Every Wo... Video Transcri...

Participants

Sharonne N. Hayes MD, Maria Perez Patient

Summary

The statistics for heart disease in women are staggering. Yet many don't know they are at risk, nor do they know the signs and symptoms of trouble. Tune in to learn what everyone should know about the leading cause of death in American women.

Webcast Transcript

ANNOUNCER: What's the leading cause of death for women? If you guessed cancer you'd be wrong. Very wrong.

SHARONNE HAYES, MD: I think that many women can quote the statistic that one in nine women will get breast cancer. But in fact, one in 27 women will die of breast cancer while one in 2.4 women will die of some type of cardiovascular disease.

ANNOUNCER: In fact, more women die of cardiovascular disease than the next 10 causes combined. It kills over 500,000 women every year, with symptoms that are underrecognized, misinterpreted and often silent.

MARIA PEREZ: I came home one afternoon in March of 1999 after working all day and-having a stomachache. Told my husband I didn't feel well, went and lay down. Went back to bed, 15 minutes later knew something was wrong but didn't know what, I just knew I had this terrible pain in my abdomen. Went to the emergency room; my husband's cardiologist happened to be walking through the emergency room when I walked in. He asked my husband what was wrong. My husband said, "It's not me, it's Maria."

SHARONNE HAYES, MD: Women are not thinking about heart disease, and that is one of the major problems. But when we look at surveys only 8% of women indicated that they perceived heart disease as their number one health risk.

MARIA PEREZ: I was 54 years of age. I run a business, I do a great deal of traveling. I had never known that this could be an issue.

ANNOUNCER: Most often heart disease is caused by blocked blood vessels, which can prevent the heart from pumping properly.

SHARONNE HAYES, MD: When we talk about the most common type of heart disease, it's coronary artery disease or coronary heart disease. And that's where there are blockages in the heart arteries that form and if they progress enough or if this little plaque or blockage ruptures, it can cause a heart attack or sudden death.

ANNOUNCER: Women should know that there is a wide range of symptoms. Recognizing them is critical.

SHARONNE HAYES, MD: The number one thing that women, and men, for that matter, need to know that most individuals do not have the "Hollywood" heart attack, where they clutch their chest and fall over and die.

The number one symptom that men and women experience is chest discomfort. But it doesn't have to be severe pain. It can be pressure that radiates up to the neck, maybe radiating into the back or shoulders or down the arm.

Shortness of breath, nausea, fatigue, light-headedness, palpitations, or where the heart seems to be racing, nausea can be a particularly prominent symptom in women, and shortness of breath seems to be more prominent.

ANNOUNCER: The sooner people having a heart attack get treatment, the better.

SHARONNE HAYES, MD: We shouldn't be waiting for the crushing substernal chest pain and falling to the floor, that we really need to be looking at these other symptoms as potential heart attack symptoms, particularly if they're new and you're at risk. They should not be afraid to go to the emergency room. The worst thing that can happen is they're told they're okay. And if they are having a heart attack, then they will get proper early treatment, which is critical to save lives.

ANNOUNCER: So what can put women at risk?

SHARONNE HAYES, MD: The major risk factors for coronary artery disease or coronary heart disease, that is, where we have plaque building up in the arteries, for women, particularly younger women, the number one preventable risk factor is smoking. Because that is one of the more powerful risk factors, and in fact, for a given dose of cigarettes, women have a higher risk than men.