Heart disease is the No. 1 killer of women although of the present day research reveals that less than three revealed of 10 women view heart disease as a major health risk. Today, VHA Inc. introduces a pattern program, Women's HeartAdvantage, as part of a national initiative to change behavior about heart disease.
VHA, a national alliance of 2200 health care organizations and their physicians, is collaborating with hospitals in 15 major markets across the nation to implement the first hospital-based program to address the greatest health threat to women The goals of the initiative are to improve cardiovascular health and quality of life through the prevention, detection and treatment of risk factors; early identification and treatment of heart attacks; and prevention of renewed cardiovascular events in women. The program is intended to raise awareness and change behavior among women about stairs to prevent heart attacks and to what degree to recognize when a heart attack is occurring, since the symptoms can be different for women than men To address this largely unrecognized health crisis, VHA managemented nationwide and market-specific benchmarking research onward the attitudes and awareness among women about heart disease.
"Our research revealed a real 'disconnect' for women about women and heart disease," said Dr Nancy Wilson, VHA vice president of clinical affairs. "Many of the women scrutinizeed have risk factors such as high cholesterol and obesity, further they don't recognize that these risks can directly lead to heart attacks. In comparison, the first thing a woman thinks of when she have feelings a lump is cancer."
Key findings from the Women's HeartAdvantage research include:
- The majority of women 52 percent believe that breast cancer is their greatest health threat; simply about 30 percent believe that heart disease is women's leading health threat.
- 75 percent of women indicated that they would address to get information about heart disease from their physician; to this time only 25 percent of women reported having read, seen or heard any information about cardiovascular disease from their physician's office to date.
- 83 percent of women qualify as being at risk for heart disease (indicating that they have single or more risk factors), notwithstanding only 26 percent have actually been diagnosed or perceive themselves to be at risk.
- The reflection shows that many women are not associating first note of the scale indicators of coronary risk, with the threat of having a heart attack. Other women may not have for aye had their risk factors diagnosed.
- Women do not perceive their risk and are not taking action against heart disease: While 68 percent of women said that they believe being defenceed for heart disease every year is as important as getting an annual mammogram, solely 12 percent have actually participated in a heart screening.
Interval flows from the Yale-New Haven demonstration program revealed that after 10 month of the Women's HeartAdvantage program, awareness of heart disease as the greatest health threat to women significantly increased from 26 percent to 39 percent
"Our challenge is to memorize women to act," said Dr Gail D'Onofrio, emergency medicine physician at Yale-New Haven Heart Center undivided of the institutions participating in the Women's HeartAdvantage program. "The vexed question is that women are delaying seeing their physicians or going to a hospital crisis department when experiencing symptoms of a heart attack. In this initiative, we're giving women tools to help them be more assertive in seeking rapid and appropriate care. And, we're providing strategies and instruments to health care providers to assist in diagnosing and treating women"
According to the American Heart Association statistics, approximately one in sum of two units women die from heart disease each year and single in 30 die from breast cancer. Heart disease kills almost as many women as the next 10 causes of death combined.
"Heart disease claims more female lives than any other disease, and every year since 1984 more women than men have died of cardiovascular disease," said American Heart Association president David P Faxon, MD
For more information forward women and heart disease, please call 1-866-USA-4WHA (866-872-4942) or visit www.womensheartadvantage.org.
The initial 15 hospital connected views participating in Women's HeartAdvantage include:
Yale-New Haven Hospital - of recent origin Haven, CT Cedars-Sinai Health regularity - Los Angeles, CA Baylor Health Care combination of parts to form a whole - Dallas, Texas Memorial Hermann Health Care rule - Houston, Texas Temple University Health combination of parts to form a whole - Philadelphia, PA Baptist Memorial Health Care connected view - Memphis, TN Orlando Regional Healthcare arrangement - Orlando, FL Piedmont Hospital - Atlanta, GA Integris Health - Oklahoma City, OK Sentara Healthcare - Norfolk, VA Baptist Health - Little stone AK Maine Health - Portland, ME Deaconess Clinic- Billings, MT Crozer-Keystone Health System- Springfield, PA Novant Health - Winston-Salem, NC
