What Every Woman Should Know About Cardiovascular Health

What every woman should know about cardiovascular health

- Anita Bartholomew

MARIE BERNHARDT* OF Marbach am Neckar, Germany, now 62, had a few brief abouts of nausea one day in May 2018. Then nausea woke her at 5 a.m. a couple of days later. I threw up several times and I had diarrhoea, says Marie. Thinking she had an infection, she took an aspirin and went back to bed.

But an hour or two later, she awoke with chest pain. Her left arm and back hurt. She also felt pressure in her chest. All are typical symptoms of heart attack.

Heart disease runs in Marie's family. She had recently been under stress due to a family member's death. And she knew from news reports that her symptoms could mean she was having a heart attack. But she just wasn't sure. So, instead of calling the emergency services, she phoned a friend who insisted she call an ambulance immediately.

Without that advice, Marie admits she might have waited longer-and that delay could have been deadly. As they rushed her to hospital, ambulance paramedics confirmed: Marie was having a heart attack. In the emergency department she lost consciousness, waking hours later in the ICU to learn that surgeons had inserted five stents to open her blocked arteries.

Marie is doing well now. But she's lucky to be alive.

Delay in calling for help is just one of several risks for women in the diagnosis and treatment of heart attack. Here's what you need to know.

Women often feel embarrassed to call a doctor. They do not want to be a nuisance. -Dr Angela Maas