Dr. Noel Bailey Meltz, Dr. Holly Andersen, Dr. Martha Grati
A federal judge held hearing Friday for a difficult cut in 22 states by the National Institutes of Health, a multibillion-dollar National Institutes of Health. NIH offers 50,000 competitive grants to more than 300,000 researchers from 2,500 universities, medical schools and research institutions.
Almost $3 billion will be spent on cardiovascular research. This is less than 6% of the NIH budget.
Despite the fact that heart disease kills almost the same number of women and men and is a greater risk to women than breast cancer, only a fifth of this fund comes directly into studying women’s minds.
As a cardiologist who led the Women’s Heart Health Agency and received funding for groundbreaking research from the NIH, the news has been devastating and could not come at a worse time. Just as we advance our fight against women’s heart disease, these cuts could delay and halt critical research. It’s a knockout blow to women’s mental health.
Over 400,000 women die from heart disease every year.
There’s no room to lose momentum. Despite progress, deaths from heart disease and stroke remain rising, with more than 400,000 women dying each year.
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There is still a gap in the perception of heart disease. This includes the broader misconception that what actually happens to everyone is affecting only men, unhealthy women and the elderly.
Furthermore, although the signs and symptoms of heart disease in women can be very different from those in men, they are not widely recognized by both women and healthcare providers, leading to missed diagnosis and delayed. Masu. And focusing on gender-based differences in medical school heart disease is not training future doctors to properly understand that female hearts are biologically different from male hearts. That means.
As cardiologists, we witness frustration and resignation when female patients feel unseen or hear, or when their symptoms are not disregarded or ignored (“Go home, just worrying about anxiety.” I feel it.”). They also see what happens when women don’t have knowledge or understanding of the symptoms of heart disease.
We see how this fits into the broader narrative that women’s health is less important or less important than men’s health.
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A new study by the Women’s Heart Alliance, an organization led by female cardiologists, captured what they see every day in exam rooms and hospitals. The goal of the study was to measure cardiologists’ views and mine them for insights that would help them to better understand the knowledge and attitudes of female patients.
Our observations draw worrying and harsh pictures.
Heart disease is the biggest cause of death in American women
The cardiologists surveyed believed that cardiac disease was increasing, but only one in four women treated that heart disease is the primary cause of death. I assume that you know. Many cannot identify signs or symptoms of heart disease beyond chest pain, such as arm, neck, back and jaw pain. Shortness of breath; vomiting; fatigue; sweating; and stomach pain.
This lack of awareness leads to fewer early interventions and increased preventable deaths.
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Just like the surprising thing, we have little progressed in simply diagnosing heart disease in women. 84% of female cardiologists surveyed said they treated patients in the past year that they were misdiagnosed by other healthcare providers.
Two-thirds say there is a higher proportion of younger women than they were five years ago. This is tracked with national data showing decline in perceptions of heart disease among women aged 25-34, with women of color taking certain risks.
Given this heart health crisis, growing important research is more important than ever. Women were not required to be included in NIH-funded research until the 1990s. We started late, but now we are moving forward, and the losses in federal research funds at institutions and universities are back significantly in our efforts.
Women’s heart health deserves a level of funding equal to its severity and prevalence.
It is also important that women be able to recognize the unique signs and symptoms of heart disease. We need to double our efforts to normalize cardiovascular care for women of all ages and reach women of color who are disproportionately affected by the disease.
Medical school training should adapt and integrate gender-specific education to the curriculum to ensure evidence-based care for women. For a long time, medical schools have not focused on gender-specific differences in heart disease, leading to a lack of diagnosis, screening and preparation for treatment in women with cardiovascular disease.
As cardiologists, we walk by women navigating the horrifying reality every day. Our mission is to prevent them from facing unnecessary and dying from preventable diseases. Today, as science is surrounded, we are moving in the wrong direction.
There was no more important time than committing to researching, diagnosis, or care of women’s minds.
Dr. Noel Bailey Meltz, a scientific advisor to the Women’s Heart Alliance, is the director of the Barbra Streisand Women’s Heart Center at the Smid Heart Institute at Cedars Sinai Medical Center in Los Angeles. Dr. Holly Andersen, medical advisor at WHA, is a cardiologist at Weil Cornell Medical Center, New York Presbyterian. Dr. Martha Grati, a senior advisor to the WHA, is the director of preventive cardiology and associate director of Barblastraisand Women’s Heart Center.