Women ‘more likely to die after heart surgery’

Women are more likely to die following heart attack treatment than men, research has found.

They are also less likely to have an angioplasty procedure, a study carried out by the Paris Cardiovascular Research Centre discovered.

Experts said this could be down to the fact that women tend to be older when they suffer heart attacks, and are also more likely to be diabetic. But they suggested fewer females receiving angioplasty treatment – a procedure to widen blocked or narrowed coronary arteries – could be down to the “wrong attitude of physicians”.

The research, which is being presented at the European Society of Cardiology Congress in London, saw a team analyse data relating to 11,420 people in the Greater Paris area who suffered cardiac arrest while not in hospital. The pre-hospital survival rate for women was 18% compared to 26% of men, while angioplasty was performed on 26% of women but 36% of men.

Professor Carlo Di Mario, team leader for Complex Coronary Heart Disease at the National Institute of Health Research, Cardiovascular Biomedical Research unit at the Royal Brompton & Harefield NHS Trust in London, said: “When they have a heart attack, women are usually older and tend to be diabetic more often, both of which are important factors that increase mortality risk. These factors are, however, unlikely to be the only reason for their higher mortality.”

He added: “The medical community must still decide how much of this gender imbalance in angioplasty treatment is due to inherent characteristics within the female population or to the wrong attitude of physicians.”

Heart attacks are mainly triggered by coronary heart disease (CHD) and are the leading cause of death in both sexes.

CHD generally affects more men than women, although from the age of 50 the chances of developing the condition are similar for both.

Prof Di Mario said lack of awareness needed to be acted on, with men more likely to pick up on symptoms, such as chest pain, along with heart attacks and heart failure.

“A 45-year-old healthy woman checks her breasts when she showers but may have never checked her cholesterol or measured her blood pressure because she will not think she is at risk of a heart attack,” he said.