Women and Heart Disease: An Evidence-Based Update

One in 4 American women die of cardiovascular disease despite strong campaigns to reduce the incidence of this condition. Unfortunately, the first symptom for half of all women with ischemic heart disease remains sudden cardiac death, which means providers are overlooking the presence of this disease in females until it is too late. Not only do women often present differently than men, women have underlying gender differences in the pathophysiology of ischemic disease. In this review we present a summary of current evidence on how to identify, diagnosis, and appropriately treat ischemic heart disease, including microvascular dysfunction, in females.