Heart disease is the leading cause of death in women in the United States, but many women are not aware of it. Similarly, many women may not know that heart disease symptoms are not the same for men and women, and many women do not recognize symptoms or delay seeking potentially life-saving treatment. When they do seek treatment, women often receive less aggressive treatment than men. Some women may also face issues such as cardiac disease during pregnancy. Issues of hormone replacement therapy are also unique to women. Fortunately, the Stony Brook Medicine's Women's Heart Center addresses the unique cardiac needs of women with a specially tailored program. It's individualized cardiac care of women by women.
The Women's Heart Center
The Women's Heart Center at Stony Brook Medicine is a comprehensive approach to addressing gender-based differences in cardiac health and heart disease through treatment, education, and research designed specifically for women.
We offer a wide range of services especially for women. We focus on risk assessment, evaluation, risk management, and can help guide you through pregnancy when you have heart conditions.
- Risk assessment and prevention: We assess your individual risk factors for heart disease using evidence-based guidelines. Once we assess your heart disease risk, we will help you manage that risk through lifestyle changes such as smoking cessation, weight loss, or medication.
- Comprehensive cardiac diagnostic evaluation: After reviewing your medical history and risk assessment report, and conducting an initial cardiac exam, we will order diagnostic tests if needed, and decide whether other consultants are necessary to determine the best treatment plan for you.
- Pregnancy care: We can help you determine if it's safe for you to have a baby and help you manage your pregnancy if necessary.
- Care of specialized populations: We understand the effects that certain disorders can have on a woman's cardiovascular health, including systemic lupus erythematosus, rheumatoid arthritis, and pulmonary hypertension. In addition, women whose religious beliefs make seeing a male cardiologist uncomfortable may be more comfortable being cared for by the Women's Heart Program.
- Lifestyle: You can control many of your risk factors for heart disease. Our team will educate you about controllable risk factors and how to make lifestyle changes to reduce your risk for heart disease. We will help you maintain or lose weight, modify your diet to lower cholesterol and blood pressure, quit smoking, and exercise more.
- Cardiac rehabilitation referrals: A cardiac rehabilitation program is a group of activities designed to help you recover from a cardiovascular event, such as a heart attack, or a cardiac procedure, such as bypass surgery, and make the lifestyle changes to prevent future events. We can evaluate you and provide a referral to a cardiac rehabilitation program.
Our Team
Directed by Noelle Mann, MD, our staff has years of training and experience in general cardiology as well as with women's cardiac issues. This enables us to provide comprehensive cardiac care for women. We take a collaborative approach to your care, stressing education and prevention. Our team is also involved in research focusing on women's heart disease. In addition to sharing the knowledge and insights we gain in the laboratory with our colleagues and patients, we also devote a large amount of time educating the general public about these critical issues.
The Stony Brook Difference
When you turn to Stony Brook Medicine, you're turning to a leader. Our Women's Heart Center is the first university-based service offered in the Long Island and New York City area. Being first is important, but we also offer unparalleled medical care with an approach that relies on evidence-based guidelines. Staffed entirely by women who are experts in women's cardiology, Stony Brook's Women's Heart Center emphasizes education and prevention. We ensure that you are aware of your risk for heart disease and can take steps to lower it. If you already have heart disease, we will design an effective, individualized treatment plan that integrates cardiac treatment into medical care for any other women's issues.
This questionnaire has been developed by our doctors to help them help women of all ages to know their risk for heart disease. It's a fact: Identifying the risk factors can help save lives!
Patient Questionnaire - This questionnaire is designed to help us help women of any age identify their risk of heart disease. Once we have reviewed your completed questionnaire, we will discuss it with you at your visit.
5 Things Every Woman Should Know about Heart Disease
- Women often experience different heart attack symptoms from men. These include discomfort or pressure in chest, pain in one or both arms, upper back, neck or jaw; stomach pain; nausea, vomiting, trouble breathing, breaking out in a cold sweat, dizziness, or lightheadedness, inability to sleep, unusual fatigue, paleness, or clammy skin.
- Every minute counts: On average, women wait up to 2 hours after experiencing heart attack symptoms to seek help. Women tend to have more serious heart attacks than men, resulting in death.
- More women die of heart disease in the United States than any other disease, and more women than men die of heart disease.
- High blood pressure causes two thirds of strokes in women.
- Being a smoker doubles the risk for heart disease: Health risks start decreasing as soon as a few hours after smoking stops, and they continue to drop over time.