Implications for reproductive medicine: Sex differences in cardiovascular disease.
Year: 2011
Type: article
Abstract: The numbers are in! Deaths due to cardiovascular disease are declining in the United States.1 That is the good news. The bad news is that cardiovascular mortality in women exceeds that of men.1 One factor contributing to this disparity may be low socioeconomic status, which deters some women from seeking medical care. However, this disparity also reflects basic differences in normal physiology and pathophysiology between males and females that are not well understood and remain understudied.2 The lack of attention to sex differences in etiology of cardiovascular disease has resulted in inadequate methodologies and strategies to prevent, diagnose, and treat cardiovascular diseases in women compared with men. For example, physicians routinely order less stress testing and coronary angiography, and treat with less proven medications, in women they believe to have angina.3
This article provides a brief overview of cardiovascular diseases affecting women compared with men, how sex hormones affect vascular function, and illustrative scenarios applicable to reproductive medicine. In this discussion, “sex” is defined by the sex chromosomes and functioning reproductive organs; “gender,” or maleness and femaleness, is defined along a continuum of how an individual functions according to societal attributes or expectations.4
Source: PubMed
Authors: Virginia M Miller, Patricia J M Best
Institution: Mayo Clinic
Language: English
Topic: Sex and Gender in Healthcare
Field: Medicine
Domain: Health Sciences
Open Access status: green
OpenAlex ID: W36496851