Women risk heart disease

WOMEN may not be getting the same standard of treatment for heart disease as men because it is mistakenly seen as a male health problem, a doctor warned yesterday.

“There is a great need to strengthen the public health message that for women, as well as men, heart disease is a reality in Ireland today,” said doctor Eilis McGovern, a heart surgeon at St. James’s Hospital.

If most people were asked to imagine a typical heart attack candidate, they would probably picture a high-flying, stressed-out man.

But they would be only half right - women suffer from heart disease too, she said.

Many are more worried about cancer.

But the risk of heart disease is 10 times higher than breast cancer, the Irish Heart Foundation said yesterday as it launched Irish Heart Week. Last year, 5,774 women and 6,140 men died from heart disease.

Yet we still have a relative lack of data on women and heart disease because much of the research has been conducted on men.

Women and medical experts may not recognise the symptoms and far too often they are misdiagnosed.

“So we need to be educated about the importance of getting accurate and speedy medical advice and services,” Dr McGovern said.

Most of the risk factors can be eliminated with a little extra care. Smoking, raised blood pressure, high cholesterol, obesity, diabetes and inactivity are factors women can change to help reduce their risk.

Women who smoke more than 40 cigarettes a day increase their risk of heart disease 20-fold. Even light smokers who have one to four cigarettes a day have twice the risk of heart disease as non-smokers. Overweight women have 2-3 times the risk of heart disease.

Almost half of Irish women are classed either overweight or obese. Older women also have to keep a check on their health as the risk of heart disease for women increases after menopause.