Category: Women and heart attacks

– posts here focus on warning signs and symptoms women experience during a cardiac event

Happy 5th Heart-iversary to me!

~ Carolyn Thomas ~ 42 Comments

by Carolyn Thomas

Five years ago today, I was hospitalized for a myocardial infarction – heart attack – or what my doctor referred to as the “widow maker”.  (Note the gender-biased semantics here, heart sisters: docs don’t call a cardiac event caused by this fully occluded coronary artery the “widower maker”, do they?)  I am, frankly, surprised to be here writing this today. For much of those past five years, I did not actually believe I would make it to this anniversary. As they say: before heart attack, every chest pain is just indigestion. Afterwards, every chest pain is another heart attack! That’s five years of being afraid every day. Such is reality.

Happy heart-iversary to me, and to all of you who are survivors, too! ♥

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See also:  Should heart patients make a ‘Bucket List’?

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When heart patients meet the Black Swan

~ Carolyn Thomas ~ 21 Comments

by Carolyn Thomas  ♥ @HeartSisters

blackswan_johngouldI have a little ritual as soon as I board the ferry from my island home for the one hour and 40 minute sailing  over to the mainland: I make a stop at the magazine rack of the B.C. Ferries gift shop. It has something to do with both the beautifully tactile feel of a new magazine and its clear association in my brain with almost every ferry ride I’ve ever taken through our west coast Gulf Islands.

That, and a pack of Mentos . . .

During last week’s sailing to Vancouver, we had barely settled into our front row seats in the forward lounge with the Mentos and a copy of Psychology Today in hand before I was riveted by editor Kaja Perina‘s third page commentary. She writes about something called the Black Swan, a reference to a 17th century philosophical thought experiment.   Continue reading “When heart patients meet the Black Swan” →

Yentl Syndrome: cardiology’s gender gap is alive and well

~ Carolyn Thomas ~ 19 Comments

by Carolyn Thomas  ♥ @HeartSisters

There’s a big fat yawning gap between cardiovascular diagnostic tests and resulting medical treatments – depending on whether doctors are looking at a male or a female patient lying there on the gurney. I’ve been saying this out loud ever since I came home from Mayo Clinic, where I first learned about the gender gap from Mayo cardiologists following my own heart attack misdiagnosis.

When asked if we might need to develop a new set of diagnostic/treatment protocol guidelines to specifically address this gap, Dr. Sharonne Hayes (founder of the Mayo Women’s Heart Clinic) responded:

“Part of the problem now is that the clinical practice guidelines are less likely to be applied to women compared to men.

“We know that when hospitals have systems in place to ensure they do provide care according to the guidelines, women’s outcomes improve.”

You may be wondering what it will take to put into place systems and guidelines (already used in male patients) for all patients, including women – in order to finally close that gender gap for good.  Continue reading “Yentl Syndrome: cardiology’s gender gap is alive and well” →

Tell me a (heart attack) story

~ Carolyn Thomas ~ 10 Comments

by Carolyn Thomas    ♥   @HeartSisters

Before the start of each shiny new year, how I love sitting down with both my current calendar and my brand new one side by side. I like flipping through both, month by month, transferring all the important birthdays, anniversaries and already-booked dates from one to the other. For the past four years, those new calendar dates have included my upcoming public speaking events as I continue to take my WomenHeart presentations on the road each year.

Besides sharing some sobering facts and figures about the very serious diagnosis of heart disease (for example, heart disease kills six times more women each year than breast cancer does, and in fact, more women than all forms of cancer combined), my presentations are mostly facts wrapped up as stories. Women in my heart health presentation audiences may think that they’re just listening to my dramatic story of heart attack misdiagnosis and survival, but by the time I get through with them, they’ve also learned about cardiac risk factors, research, anatomy, symptoms, treatments and prevention. Research tells us that “storytelling is a vastly powerful tool.”  And here’s why.  Continue reading “Tell me a (heart attack) story” →