A cardiologist provides insight into how a specialist can examine a woman with severe heart disease and then tell her she’s in great shape
Cardiologists do indeed miss severe heart disease in women (men as well, but more prevalently, women).
One reason is because despite all the mounting media attention given to women’s heart disease, many doctors take the symptoms more seriously in men, and also, symptoms of heart disease in women oftentimes differ from those in men.
“Communication between doctor and patient is critical,” says Suzanne Steinbaum, MD, a New York cardiologist for 20+ years and founder of SRS heart — a groundbreaking program for womens’ holistic health prevention.
We have all heard many stories of young women who were dismissed by their doctors as being healthy, only to find out later that they had heart disease.
“It is important, from the patient’s perspective to discuss all the symptoms, and address all concerns,” says Dr. Steinbaum.
“Discussing family history is crucial in giving your doctor a true understanding of your own risk.”
Dr. Steinbaum adds, “Heart disease is invisible until is presents itself, so even if you are thin and fit, you can still be at risk.”
Diet is a big player in coronary artery disease. No matter how hard you train in the gym, you cannot out-train bad nutrition.
Shutterstock/Altagracia Art
You may look great and be able to knock off pushups and run 5Ks, but a processed-food diet and mental stress can cause plaque to build up inside your coronary arteries.
“Baseline EKG’s, echocardiograms and blood tests don’t always predict who is going to have a heart attack, and even simple stress tests without imaging studies may be misleading,” says Dr. Steinbaum.
“Communicating symptoms and changes in activity levels might be the first clues that there are cardiac problems.”
Unfortunately, though some women are aware of recently-new symptoms, they don’t connect them to possible severe heart disease.
My mother experienced shortness of breath for months and attributed this to narcotic painkillers, which CAN cause labored breathing
Then one morning she upchucked, after suffering shortness of breath, and still, did not make a connection.
My father even questioned her on what she ate the day before! Severe coronary plaque buildup was the last thing on their minds at this point.
However, the vomiting tipped me off and I took her to the ER where she was diagnosed with reflux disease and released!
Two days later I took her back for chest pains. She was admitted, and the next day I was told by three doctors that a massive heart attack was imminent due to blockages of at least 97 percent in five coronary arteries.
Ten months prior, my mother’s cardiologist (not one of the three) told her, “You’re the last person I’d ever think would have a heart attack.” Ten months later she had emergent quintuple bypass surgery.
Dr. Steinbaum says, “Sometimes your sixth sense tells you somethingis significantly wrong. As a patient, you must empower yourself.”
One way a woman can do that is to undergo a calcium score test which is pretty accurate for determining the likelihood of coronary artery disease, and near-future heart attack, which kills about 267,000 U.S. women every year – over six times the rate of breast cancer death.
