Rates of heart disease among women are higher than men, which is why women need to keep up with heart health even more.
SAN ANTONIO — Heart disease is the number one killer for women because experts say women often tend to ignore the signs and symptoms. One of the big reasons, they focus on the health of others, more than themselves.
If you have flown on an airplane you’ve heard to put on your oxygen first before helping others – it’s no different for your heart. If that organ isn’t healthy, eventually you’re going to have a hard time helping others too. That’s why Go Red For Women exists, to get women to look at their heart health first.
“To first focus on themselves and take care of themselves so they can, they can be healthy and they can be productive members of the society. women are notorious for taking care of everyone else around them except themselves,” Dr. Monica Kapur, the President and CEO of University Medicine Associates said.
Some of the risk factors for heart disease you can change include diet, smoking, high blood pressure, high cholesterol, diabetes, physical inactivity, poor diet, and obesity.
Being overweight is a big risk factor. The higher your weight goes, the higher the chance of developing heart disease.
“We always encourage, not just adults, but also children sometimes, to actually come and be seen by their doctors in an annual basis because the reality is, obesity is an epidemic,” Dr. Kapur added.
Going through menopause also increases a woman’s risk for heart disease, as it often results in weight gain with estrogen dropping.
“And so, they focus on those symptoms rather than actually, truly looking at what is causing what’s happening around them. What ends up happening is they also tend to gain weight much easier,” Dr. Kapur said.
As medicine and technology advance, new pictures about women’s health emerge.
The American Heart Association says in the mid-1980s the Framingham Heart Study was the first in-depth long-term cardiovascular study into sex-specific patterns of heart disease. In 1999 the first women-specific clinical recommendations were released for the prevention of the condition. Then in 2001 an Institute of Medicine report pointed out underrepresentation of women in clinical trials, calling for a better understanding about how women were affected by the disease.
“If you are preemptively working towards, in the early stages of your life, if you develop healthy eating habits, that goes a long way,” Dr. Kapur said.
This Wednesday, Feb. 11, University Health is sponsoring this year’s Go Red For Women Summit in downtown SA, which focuses on raising the awareness of heart disease in women.