MANHASSET, N.Y. (CBSNewYork) — Friday, girls throughout the nation are carrying pink to attract consideration to a pandemic — cardiovascular disease, the primary killer of girls.
CBS2’s Carolyn Gusoff spoke with one younger mom who by no means imagined she was in danger.
“Like an elephant was sitting on my chest,” stated Cassidy Hayes, of Backyard Metropolis.
Hayes was anticipating a child and remembers the wrestle to breathe. Docs brushed it off as a symptom of being pregnant.
“They might take one take a look at me and say, you’re younger, you’re wholesome, welcome to being pregnant,” Hayes stated.
After giving beginning, she searched her signs on-line and located she wasn’t wholesome — her coronary heart muscle was giving out.
“The heart specialist identified me with postpartum cardiomyopathy. That is principally congestive coronary heart failure,” she stated.
With no household historical past, she may have died if untreated.
“When the center muscle is that weak, it’s in danger for what’s referred to as sudden cardiac loss of life,” stated Dr. Evelina Grayver, with Northwell’s Katz Institute for Girls’s Well being.
Grayver says the case is uncommon however underscores the warning to girls on this National Wear Red Day — pay attention to the physique’s warning indicators of heart problems, accountable for one in three girls’s deaths.
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Girls’s signs are completely different than males’s.
“Shortness of breath shouldn’t be ever off pawned as nothing or nervousness or anything … Girls can have shortness of breath, palpitations, some dizziness, mild headedness and important quantity of fatigue,” Grayver stated.
In accordance with the American Coronary heart Affiliation, most coronary heart illness and stroke deaths are preventable. Nevertheless, cardiovascular illnesses proceed to be a girls’s best well being menace.
Docs from Stony Brook Coronary heart Institute say prevention begins early.
“Buildup of plaque within the blood vessels begins in your late teenagers to early 20s, so maintaining a healthy diet, avoiding meals which might be excessive in saturated fat, processed meals,” heart specialist Dr. Noelle Mann, of North Suffolk Cardiology, stated.
Girls’s hearts are literally completely different than males’s in that they’ll develop into thicker and fewer pliable.
With medicine and common cardio work-outs, Hayes resides a coronary heart wholesome life. Her child is now 11 years outdated.
“Take heed to your physique,” she stated. “You need to put your personal well being first so that you’re there on your youngsters down the highway.”
Her case is a reminder to by no means take our well being as a right, and when one thing doesn’t really feel proper, take motion.
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Smoking is main threat issue for coronary heart illness and train is necessary, even beginning with 5 minutes per day. For extra info, go to goredforwomen.org.
