Heart pain: women seek help too late

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MunichActually, it is the men who are considered notorious refusal to visit the doctor. It looks different when it comes to alarming heart problems: Then women tend to be hesitant. The signals can be harbingers of a heart attack.

Because not every heart attack comes out of the blue. Often it is preceded by what is known as angina pectoris, a constriction of the heart. Then attacks of tearing or burning pain occur in the chest, which usually last for several minutes. The cause is a phase-wise reduced blood flow to the heart, mostly due to calcified coronary arteries.

“Waiting too long is dangerous. The longer you wait, the more difficult the treatment becomes, ”warns Cathrine Kreatsulas of the Harvard School of Public Health.

Chest pain

For the study, the epidemiologist and her team asked heart patients about symptoms of a tight heart and when they then decided to seek help.

They found that sufferers typically go through various psychological stages before going to the doctor. This applies to both men and women:

• The phase of uncertainty in which the patient assigns the pain to other health problems - for example heartburn or tension
• The denial phase when they try to ignore the symptoms
• The moment when you speak to friends or family about your complaints for the first time
• A phase in which they recognize the seriousness of the situation and become afraid
• Only then do they go to the doctor and accept their illness

Women are too optimistic

Women, the researchers found, are stuck in the second phase longer. “They tend to be more optimistic than men and hope that the symptoms will go away on their own,” says study director Kreatsulas. "While men are quicker to discuss their problem with friends or family members, women tend to wait for someone to approach them and say, 'You look terrible'."

For this reason, women delayed seeing the doctor one and a half times as often as men until the symptoms became more severe and occurred more frequently. One reason for this could be that a heart attack is still more likely to be attributed to men than women - although women are just as at risk.

Take warning signs seriously

Angina is a warning sign that must be taken seriously. It can be treated with medication or, in more severe cases, by surgical widening of the coronary arteries (bypass).

What every person affected should take to heart: If an attack does not improve within a few minutes, call the emergency doctor without hesitation! (cf)

Source: Heart and Stroke Foundation Canada press release, October 28, 2014

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