by Jaycee Miller 

Although the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) says heart disease is the leading cause of death of men and women, experts point out that there are stark differences between how the two genders experience the condition. 

The CDC also reports common risk factors for heart disease that tend to occur more frequently in men include a medical history of high blood pressure, diabetes, being overweight and/or obese, eating an unhealthy diet, maintaining a sedentary lifestyle and using alcohol in “excessive” amounts. 

While women that have heart disease can experience these risk factors, a group of healthcare professionals wrote in Circulation, a journal of the American Heart Association, that some fail to recognize that many life experiences unique to them—preeclampsia, gestational hypertension, gestational diabetes, preterm delivery and/or delivery of small or gestational-age infants—also increase their chances for heart disease.  

Women that have experienced any of these medical events should ask their physician to screen them for their 10-year and lifetime atherosclerotic cardiovascular disease risk, and the more traditional heart disease risk factors (e.g., high blood pressure, diabetes and obesity, according to the Mayo Clinic.) 

Craig Strauss, M.D., MPH, a cardiologist at Allina Health’s Eden Prairie Clinic and vice president for quality, innovation and advanced analytics at the Minneapolis Heart Institute, adds that when heart disease occurs, men and women can experience the condition differently.  

Men with heart disease “often describe their pain as central or left-sided chest tightness or pressure with radiation to the left arm associated with physical exertion,” he relates. Women with the same condition “may describe pain in the jaw or neck or left shoulder pain and are more likely to note these symptoms at rest or with mental stress in addition to physical exertion. Moreover, women are generally older than men at the time of presentation.”  

Regardless of the patient’s gender, not all patients with these symptoms realize they are indicative of heart disease, according to Strauss.  

“People may downplay or attribute symptoms of coronary artery disease to acid reflux, a bad night’s sleep, a muscle strain, or fatigue,” he says. Regardless of symptom or gender, men and women with the symptoms described should see a physician right away, he adds. “I generally tell both men and women that the best approach is to rule out a worrisome issue like coronary artery disease or an acute heart attack and then treat the less worrisome things like acid reflux once the heart attack is ruled out.” 

Strauss adds that Allina Health recently opened a clinic that focuses on “patient education, symptom presentation and rapid diagnosis by combining primary care and cardiovascular care in one integrated clinic that leverages digital technologies at the point of care.” Through this clinic, they are working to eliminate some of the gender differences in heart disease.  

Jaycee Miller is a freelance writer and researcher living in New Jersey.