I always wondered if women's heart disease would increase as they entered the workplace. Apparently that's exactly what has been happening.
Younger U.S. women are suffering heart attacks at
a higher rate now than 20 years ago -- even while the picture has improved for
younger men. Those are the key findings from a new study
of four U.S. communities, in which researchers report the heart attack rate
among women younger than 55 has steadily inched upward since 1995. In contrast,
the rate dipped among men in that age group.
By 2014, those younger women accounted for
31 percent of hospitalizations for heart attack -- up from 21 percent in the
late 1990s.
The findings were published Feb. 19 in a special issue of
the journal Circulation focusing on women's heart health.
It's not entirely clear why heart attacks rose among
younger women. But the study period spanned a time of increasing obesity rates
nationwide.
"Young women have a higher prevalence of obesity
than men in the same age group, and this is especially true among
minorities," said senior researcher Melissa Caughey. She is an instructor
in cardiology at the University of North Carolina, in Chapel Hill.
"Obesity can be a risk factor for high blood
pressure and diabetes," Caughey said, "and all three can lead to
a higher risk for heart attack."
In fact, the study found, high blood pressure and
diabetes were more common among younger women who suffered a heart attack,
versus their male counterparts.
Dr. Suzanne Steinbaum pointed out that "obesity,
high blood pressure and diabetes all seem to be more detrimental to
women." She is a spokesperson for the American Heart Association who was
not involved in the study.
"I wish I could say I'm surprised by these findings,
but I'm not," added Steinbaum, who directs women's cardiovascular
prevention, health and wellness at Mount Sinai Hospital, in New York City.
The results are based on a 19-year study of adults living
in four U.S. communities in North Carolina, Mississippi, Minnesota and
Maryland. Over that time, there were nearly 29,000 hospitalizations for heart
attack: 30 percent were among people aged 35 to 54.
But while that hospitalization rate dipped among younger
men over the years, it crept up among younger women -- to between two and three
heart attacks per 1,000 women by 2014, the findings showed.
At that point, 31 percent of heart attack
hospitalizations were happening among younger women -- up from 21 percent in
the late 1990s.
In contrast, the number of young men hospitalized for a
heart attack declined over time -- though the rate remained higher compared
with young women, at roughly four per 1,000 by 2014.
One problem, according to Caughey's team, is the enduring
myth that heart disease is a "man's disease."
Steinbaum agreed. Even among doctors, she said, there
remains an "unconscious bias" to take conditions like high blood
pressure less seriously in women, versus men.
The study did find that younger women with heart attacks
were less likely than men to get recommended medications to reduce their risk
of another attack.
For women, Caughey said, the findings underscore the
importance of early attention to prevention.
"Many of the risk factors for heart attack are
modifiable," she said. "Although it's never too late to adopt a
heart-healthy lifestyle, earlier is better. And that's something young women
can keep in mind."
That can, however, be easier said than done -- and that's
a big part of the problem, according to Steinbaum. Women in their 30s to 50s
are often working and raising kids, and may be caring for aging parents, too.
"The lives of women today are really
complicated," Steinbaum said. "We need to figure out a way to take
care of ourselves, too."
Getting up and moving throughout the day is critical, she
said -- whether that means going to the gym, taking a walk or turning on music
and dancing with your kids.
"Exercise is the best medicine," Steinbaum
said. "Make the time, as best you can, to get that 150 minutes of activity
every week."
A second study in the same issue highlights the
importance of simply getting off the couch. It followed older women, finding
that the less time women spent sitting or lying down throughout the day, the
lower their risk of eventually suffering a heart attack or stroke.
The effect was independent of how much time women
dedicated to exercise, like brisk walking. That, researchers said, suggests
that older women benefit just from getting up and moving throughout the day.
Emotional Stress Linked to Women’s Heart Problems
Researchers have found that
emotional stressors — such as those provoking anger — may cause changes in the
nervous system that controls heart rate and trigger a type of coronary artery
dysfunction that occurs more frequently in women than men.
https://psychcentral.com/news/2014/03/14/emotional-stress-linked-to-womens-heart-problems/67089.html
Job Stress may raise women’s heart attack risk
Previous studies have shown
that job stress predicts cardiovascular disease in men, but
research in women has been sparse, with mixed results, says Michelle A. Albert,
MD, MPH, of Brigham and Women's Hospital in Boston.
In her study, the risk of experiencing any
cardiovascular event, including heart attacks or procedures to open clogged
arteries, was about 40% higher in women with job stress, compared with women
with little on-the-job stress.
Stress poses double risk to women after heart attack
Researchers have known
for decades that stress contributes to heart disease. But a new analysis by
researchers at Duke Medicine shows mental stress may tax women's hearts more
than men's.
The research appears
online Oct. 13, 2014, in the Journal of the American College of
Cardiology.
"Normally when
under stress, we fight back or run away. In order to do that, we need to pump
more blood to the body," said Wei Jiang, M.D., the study's senior author
and professor of medicine, psychiatry and behavioral sciences at the Duke
University School of Medicine. "According to the data, women were not
reacting that way as well as men were."
Stress poses double risk to women after heart attack
After analyzing the results, investigators
found 22 percent of women developed MSIMI, compared to just 11 percent of men.
There was no sex difference in typical cardiovascular risk factors, but women
had enhanced microvascular dysfunction during stress, suggesting the
microvasculature—the smallest blood vessels in the body—play a large role in
vulnerability to MSIMI. Interestingly, microvascular dysfunction did not
predict MSIMI in men, suggesting this sex imbalance may be due to
microcirculatory abnormities in women.
Gender
Matters: Heart Disease Risk in Women
Most of our ideas about heart disease in women used to come from
studying it in men. But there are many reasons to think that it's different in
women. A woman's symptoms are often different from a man's, and she's much more
likely than a man to die within a year of having a heart attack. Women also
don't seem to fare as well as men do after taking clot-busting drugs or
undergoing certain heart-related medical procedures.
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