Women's Chest Pain: What Once Was "Benign" Could Now Spell "Trouble"

There's no particular pattern," Dr. Marroquin observes.

So while a diagnosis of microvascular dysfunction may explain a patient's chest pain today, it doesn't provide any useful information about her future cardiovascular risks, he says. It is of no value in determining whether or not she is likely to have a stroke or heart attack tomorrow.

That's why Dr. Marroquin tells patients, "The most important thing to remember is that most women die of garden-variety heart attacks." To prevent a heart attack, he stresses how important it is to know your cholesterol levels and blood pressure, stay active and stop smoking.

On the Web

For more information on the WISE study findings, visit the National Institutes of Health.

SOURCES: C. Noel Bairey Merz, MD, FACC, medical director, Women's Health Program, Preventive and Rehabilitative Cardiac Center, Cedars-Sinai Medical Center, and professor of medicine, David Geffen School of Medicine, University of California, Los Angeles; Oscar C. Marroquin, MD, assistant professor of medicine and assistant director of the Ladies Hospital Aid Society Women's Heart Center at the University of Pittsburgh Medical Center; Feb. 7, 2006, news release, Cedars-Sinai Medical Center