Findings from the federally funded Women’s Ischemia Syndrome Evaluation (WISE) study — a landmark investigation into ischemic heart disease (meaning reduced blood supply to the heart muscle) – are helping us to understand that, as the Harvard Women’s Health Watch puts it: heart disease – like cancer – is not one, but several disorders.
While I was at Mayo Clinic shortly after my heart attack, I also learned that at least two of these disorders are far more commonly seen in women than in men’s “Hollywood heart attacks”. These two heart conditions involve the smallest of the heart’s blood vessels in coronary microvascular disease (MVD) as well as non-obstructive issues like coronary artery spasm (CAS). Continue reading
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