For men and women, cardiovascular disease is the main cause of death. But your risks and symptoms may be different.

 

For men and women, cardiovascular disease is the main cause of death. But your risks and symptoms may be different.

Cardiovascular disease is the leading cause of death for both sexes in the United States. But these unimaginable statistics do not record differences in the development of the disease in men and women. "Most of what we know about the diagnosis and treatment of hereditary diseases comes from middle age research, we extracted these data," says the doctor. Nadita Scott, cardiologist and co-director of Corrigan Women's Cardiovascular Health at Harvard's Massachusetts General Hospital. As a result, the way the disease is different in older women in the development of coronary heart disease have been misunderstood and outsourced, he said.

Distinctive Aspects of Heart Disease in Women

In men, a heart attack usually begins with the sudden breakage of a cholesterol-filled plate in a coronary artery, which triggers a blood clot. In younger women in particular, a plaque is more likely to erode in the vascular wall rather than explode. "Women also have minor, non-fatal heart attacks," says the doctor. Scott.

Women are also more common than men to develop a small vascular disease, a condition where blockages occur in small vessels in the heart muscle rather than in the surface arteries. "We see a lot of women who have a classic angina pectoris, but their great coronary arteries seem to be normal, so they say it's not their heart but you could have a heart attack if that condition is not cured," he says dr. Scott.

Postmenopausal women are also prone to a sudden and unusual change in the shape of the heart muscle known as Tako-
cardiomyopathy tsubo, which occurs in response to severe emotional stress. Also included as "broken heart syndrome", the condition is characterized by breast pain and changes in the electrical activity of the heart, which imitate a heart attack. However, arteries appear outside the plaque. During the first event, these women run the risk of heart rhythm, shock or even death.

The myth of atypical symptoms

Some attempts to clarify gender-specific differences have led to misunderstandings about the nature of angina symptoms in women. In particular, women have been thought to have thinner "atypical" symptoms that differ from the classic breast pain pattern: stress and overwhelming pressure described by men. But a recent study published in JAMA Internal Medicine has revealed that men and women have similar disadvantages when they have a blockage of coronary arteries. Women, however, are more of a "silent" heart attack, which has no symptoms at all. This variation may be due to the fact that women are older when a heart attack occurs and may be more likely to suffer from diabetes.

Differences in beats

The risk of stroke is also different between the sexes. Every year, about 425,000 women suffer from a stroke, 55,000 more than men. This is partly explained by women's longer life expectancy, as advanced age is an important part of the risk of stroke. However, women face exceptional risks of stroke due to hormones, reproductive health, pregnancy and childbirth. This understanding led the American Heart Association and the American Stroke Association to publish guidelines for stroke prevention in women in 2013.

"Pregnancy is a stress test for your cardiovascular system," says the doctor. Scott. The history of eclampsia or preeclampsia - a complication of pregnancy characterized by high blood pressure, high protein content in the urine and sometimes convulsions - doubles the risk of a stroke or a stroke. over the next five or fifteen years.

Because birth control pills are known to increase blood pressure, women should be checked for hypertension before starting this drug. Women suffering from headache with aura (visual disturbances) are also more likely to be a stroke