Tag: vasospasm

What kind of heart attacks do young women have?

~ Carolyn Thomas ~ 21 Comments

by Carolyn Thomas  ♥  @HeartSisters

In your average garden-variety textbook heart attack, the cause is typically a sudden lack of oxygenated blood supply feeding the heart muscle, caused by a significant blockage in one of your coronary arteries. This blockage is what doctors call the culprit lesion.

But in a new study led by Yale University cardiologist Dr. Erica Spatz, researchers remind us that although this “culprit lesion” classification of heart attack applies to about 95% of men under age 55, only 82.5% of younger women experience this kind of heart attack.(1)    Continue reading “What kind of heart attacks do young women have?” →

Misdiagnosed: women’s coronary microvascular and spasm pain

~ Carolyn Thomas ~ 117 Comments

by Carolyn Thomas  ♥  @HeartSisters

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 are coronary microvascular disease (MVD) and coronary artery spasm (CAS). Continue reading “Misdiagnosed: women’s coronary microvascular and spasm pain” →

How women can have heart attacks without having any blocked arteries

~ Carolyn Thomas ~ 99 Comments

by Carolyn Thomas  ♥  @HeartSisters

Turns out that the kind of heart attack that I had (caused by a 95% blockage in the big left anterior descending coronary artery) – the so-called widowmaker heart attack – may actually be relatively uncommon  in women. You might guess that fact by its nickname.  It’s not, after all, called the “widower-maker”.

While cardiologists warn that heart disease can’t be divided into male and female forms, there are some surprising differences. Cardiologist Dr. Amir Lerman at the world famous Mayo Clinic in Rochester, Minnesota, told the Los Angeles Times recently:

“When it comes to acute heart attacks and sudden death from cardiac arrest, women have these kinds of events much more often without any obstructions in their coronary arteries.”

Instead, it appears that a significant portion of women suffer from another form of heart disease altogether. It affects not the superhighway coronary arteries but rather the smaller arteries, called microvessels. These tiny arteries deliver blood directly to the heart muscle.

Ironically, I can now boast two diagnoses for the price of one – first, the widowmaker heart attack caused by a fully occluded coronary artery back in 2008, and then, after several months of puzzling, ongoing cardiac symptoms – like chest pain, shortness of breath, and crushing fatigue – a second diagnosis of inoperable coronary microvascular disease. Continue reading “How women can have heart attacks without having any blocked arteries” →