Cardiovascular Disease in Women: The Facts

Cardiovascular disease (CVD) is the leading cause of death in women. One of every 2.4 women will die of CVD, and it claims almost 500,000 female lives annually.1 Since women are more likely than men to have sudden death as their initial presenting symptom, early prevention measures are even more important in women to prevent this catastrophic outcome.²

Ironically, more than 50% of women who were surveyed did not know CVD was the leading killer of women, and only 5% identified heart disease as their greatest health problem.3 This unawareness likely has contributed to the increase of cardiovascular deaths among women, whereas the number of cardiovascular deaths among men has slowly decreased since 1984.4