New awareness campaign for women’s heart disease
March 18
March 18 – A new initiative was launched yesterday to highlight the differences in heart disease treatment for men and women. The European Society of Cardiology (ESC) has set up the ‘Women at Heart’ campaign to raise awareness of women’s cardiovascular disease and encourage further research. In Europe, heart disease is the leading cause of death in women, killing more women (55 per cent) than men (43 per cent), but is still often seen as a ‘male disease’. The organisers believe that there is “disturbing gap in the knowledge, understanding, and general awareness of cardiovascular disease in women, not only in the women themselves, but across medical audiences as a whole.” They explain that women’s symptoms often differ from men’s, leading to under-diagnosis. In addition, both medical training and clinical trials tend to focus on men. Launched at the Spring Meeting of the ESC’s 49 National Cardiac Societies, Women at Heart will involve many events and activities. Professor Silvia Priori, of the Fondazione Salvatore Maugeri, Pavia, Italy, is chairing Women at Heart. She said: “The ESC has tremendous potential, through its network of 49 countries, to pass on these crucial messages. “By encouraging each of our National Cardiac Societies to take up the mission, there is great potential to increase the awareness of women’s cardiovascular disease patterns and directly improve the quality of care of women with heart disease and stroke across Europe. “Women need to be better educated on the importance of heart-healthy lifestyles and sufficiently screened for risk factors before heart disease strikes,” she concluded.
source: englemed.demon.co.uk
