Women and Heart Attacks

Women have different heart attack symptoms than men. What's worse almost 50 percent of women who die of a heart attack have no clinical symptoms at all, according to a U.S. national Institutes of Health study.

Rather than the classic symptoms for men: severe chest pain, pain that radiates to the jaw, or down one or both arms, women report cold sweats, light-headedness, nausea.


Additional symptoms that have been reported to Home Health nurses are:

• sudden tiredness, so much so that the woman has to lay down and rest
• elbow pain
• feeling of doom

The elbow pain is an odd one, and personally I've only heard that symptom once. The woman visited her doctor, who diagnosed "Tennis elbow". After several days, with the pain persisting, her husband called 911. The woman's vital signs were fine, so she wasn't taken to the hospital.

As it turns out, she was having a heart attack. Neither she nor the cardiologist could explain how it happened that she survived several days of a heart attack. It was an event for case study. In the end, the damage to her heart was so severe, that she ended up with a transplant.

The lesson here is:

• Seek help immediately if you're having a heart attack, call 911
• Do not drive yourself to the hospital (yes, people do that)
• Listen to your body, pay attention to what it's telling you
• If you're not satisfied with the diagnosis the doctor gives you, ask for further tests

If you or a woman you know has had a heart attack, and had symptoms other than those listed, please let me know.