Heart Month Campaign Puts the Focus on Women

Cardiovascular disease can debilitate or kill.

As startling as that sounds, this is the message the Heart and Stroke Foundation is conveying through their controversial media campaign, “Make Death Wait.”

Dubious advertising aside, one fact is unequivocal: the foundation is putting the spotlight on women.

It is now an irrefutable fact that cardiovascular disease (CVD) is the number one killer of Canadian women—taking more women ’s lives than all forms of cancer combined—and the foundation wants to reverse this trend.

It’s a real concern that women’s heart health has not kept pace with men’s.

Dr. Beth Abramson, Heart and Stroke Foundation

So for Heart Month this February, if women are to take away anything it is this: know the warning signs of an impending heart attack or stroke.

These include acute chest pain; shortness of breath; sudden weakness, numbing, tingling in any part of the body; visual disturbances; impaired or slurred speech; abrupt “thunderclap”-like headache or unusual, persistent headaches; loss of balance, or an unexpected fall.

These symptoms can act as an internal life-alert system. Furthermore, understanding the differences between male and female symptoms of a heart attack or stroke can be essential and cautionary.

Not just a ‘man’s disease’

The Heart and Stroke Foundation and American Heart Association want to dispel the myth that CVD is a man’s disease.

While chest pain is a common symptom for men, statistics documented in the Journal of the American Medical Association and American Journal of Respiratory and Critical Care reveal that in some cases, as high as 43 percent of women “reported no chest pain before having their heart attacks, and those who did report it described the sensation as pressure, aching, or tightness instead of specific pain.”

For women, the most common symptoms reported were unexplained or unusual fatigue (71 percent) and sleep disturbance (48 percent).

Symptoms of CVD tend to be not well-recognized in women and physicians often miss the diagnosis.

Dr. Beth Abramson, cardiologist and spokesperson for the Heart and Stroke Foundation, has said “it’s a real concern that women’s heart health has not kept pace with men’s.”

According to Health Canada’s “Women and Heart Health” report, “women are under-represented in heart health research and prevention studies. The lack of data and the consequent difficulty of determining appropriate interventions for women hamper their ability to deal with heart disease.”

In a more extensive study, Health Canada finds that “this omission has had far-reaching consequences for accurate diagnosis, effective treatment, and prevention of cardiovascular disease for women. Using male norms and standards for CVD results in numerous and potentially fatal ‘pitfalls’ in both diagnosis and treatment.”

New research in BC

In October 2011, Providence Health Care and University of British Columbia announced establishment of a research program—the first of its kind in B.C.—focusing on the impact of gender-based differences in the manifestation of CVD.

According to a media statement, a team led by Dr. Karin Humphries “will focus on researching the detection and early treatment of cardiovascular disease and finding new ways to improve the education of physicians, women, and their families on heart disease and stroke.”

In addition to health promotion, prevention, and research, rapid assessments in clinical practice or emergency departments can mean the difference between life and death.

That is one of the propositions behind establishment of the BC Stroke Strategy in 2010. One of the goals of Vancouver Coastal Health is to correct acknowledged ambiguities of stroke care within the system.

The Public Health Agency of Canada’s Stroke Highlights 2011 Report, “Tracking Heart Disease and Stroke in Canada,” confirms this is a concern.

It states, “Hospital and death data under-report the true number of strokes in Canada.”

The more facts acquired regarding health, disability, and mortality rates among women with CVD, the better the opportunity of reducing the consequential effects or misdiagnosis of a heart attack or stroke.

Anne Pillsbury dedicates this article to her late father, a medical doctor known among his friends as “Dr. Peter,” who enjoyed a healthy heart through his 95 years, and recently passed away with a peaceful heart.