A Different Picture Of Heart Disease
In Feb 2006, researchers reported that many women suffer from a fundamentally different heart disease from men and is easily missed from standard tests. Moreover, women do not seek treatment as early as men, and women’s hearts are smaller and their blood vessels are more easily damaged. Another possible reason is that the disease could manifest itself differently. As a result, women are less likely to survive heart attacks than men. Many women are still unaware that heart disease and stroke have emerged as the top killers of women worldwide.
The researchers found that for some women, instead of developing obvious blockages in the arteries supplying blood to the heart, plaque are accumulated more evenly inside the major arteries and in smaller blood vessels. In other cases, their arteries fail to expand properly or go into spasm, often at times of physical or emotional stress. These abnormalities are very common for younger women and these can be dangerous because they could trigger life-threatening heart attacks. (more…)