Women display different heart attack symptoms to men leading to misdiagnosis

A 40 year old woman sought medical advice after suffering from extreme tiredness and dizziness when exercising - she was a marathon runner. Doctors failed to recognize her signs of heart disease until 8 months later when she collapsed and required emergency bypass surgery. WomanHeart, a national women's heart health organization believes that they difference in heart disease symptoms between men and women is unrecognized by many professionals and frequently leads to misdiagnosis. Where a heart attack in men causes chest pain, in women it can cause milder symptoms such as indigestion, anxiety and severe fatigue. This means that women are more likely to die from a heart attack than men. Also, women respond differently to treatment than men. For example, women suffer higher rates of complications from angioplasties than men and women are twice as likely to die from having bypass surgery as men. Women also receive less treatment than men in general - women are less likely to be prescribed cholesterol-lowering drugs or cardiac rehabilitation than men.

Source: summary of medical news story as reported by ABC News

Related Disease Topics:

• Heart disease
• Heart attack
• High cholesterol

Related Symptom Topics:

• Extreme tiredness
• Tiredness
• Dizziness
• Chest pain
• Indigestion
• Anxiety
• Severe fatigue

Article Source Details

About: Women display different heart attack symptoms to men leading to misdiagnosis

Date: 1 December 2004

Source: ABC News

Author: John McKenzie

URL: http://abcnews.go.com/WNT/HealthyWomen/story?id=295352

Related Medical Topics

This summary article refers to the following medical categories:

• Angioplasty
• Medication
• Medication and heart attack
• Medication and heart disease
• Medication and high cholesterol
• Death from heart attack
• Death from heart disease
• Misdiagnosis and heart attack
• Misdiagnosis and heart disease
• Misdiagnosis (type of Medical misadventure)
• Undiagnosed
• Undiagnosed and heart attack
• Undiagnosed and heart disease
• Undiagnosed and extreme tiredness
• Undiagnosed and tiredness
• Undiagnosed and dizziness
• Undiagnosed and chest pain
• Undiagnosed and indigestion
• Undiagnosed and anxiety
• Undiagnosed and severe fatigue
• Misdiagnosis of extreme tiredness
• Misdiagnosis of tiredness
• Misdiagnosis of dizziness
• Misdiagnosis of chest pain
• Misdiagnosis of indigestion
• Misdiagnosis of anxiety
• Misdiagnosis of severe fatigue

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