Women’s Heart Health

Cardiovascular disease is the leading cause of death in women, yet women are diagnosed later and treated less intensively than men. A women's heart health service focuses on the ways heart disease differs in women: distinct symptoms, conditions that mainly affect women, and risk linked to pregnancy and menopause.

The aim is not separate medicine but a more accurate one: recognising that a woman with chest symptoms and clean-looking arteries may still have a real and treatable cardiac cause, and that pregnancy complications are an early warning of later heart disease.

Conditions this service looks after

• Angina and heart attack with non-obstructed arteries (ANOCA, INOCA and MINOCA)
• Coronary microvascular dysfunction and vasospastic angina
• Spontaneous coronary artery dissection (SCAD), a cause of heart attack in younger women
• Takotsubo (stress) cardiomyopathy
• Peripartum cardiomyopathy
• Heart disease in pregnancy, including valve and congenital conditions
• High blood pressure after pre-eclampsia or gestational hypertension
• Heart failure with preserved ejection fraction
• Cardiac effects of breast cancer treatment
• Rising cardiovascular risk after menopause, including early menopause

Tests you may be offered

• Risk assessment including female-specific factors: Pre-eclampsia, gestational diabetes, preterm birth, polycystic ovary syndrome, early menopause and autoimmune disease.
• ECG and echocardiography: Baseline structure and function; strain imaging during cancer therapy.
• CT coronary angiography: Shows non-obstructive plaque that still warrants preventive treatment.
• Stress imaging with perfusion MRI or PET: Can quantify blood flow and detect microvascular disease.
• Invasive coronary function testing: Measures flow reserve and provokes spasm with acetylcholine when arteries look normal but symptoms persist.
• Cardiac MRI: Distinguishes heart attack, myocarditis and takotsubo when the angiogram shows no blockage.
• Blood tests: Lipids including lipoprotein(a), glucose, thyroid function and, where relevant, BNP.

Treatments available

• Preventive therapy on equal terms: Statins, blood pressure treatment and antiplatelets when indicated; women benefit as much as men.
• Targeted angina treatment: Beta blockers, ACE inhibitors and statins for microvascular angina; calcium channel blockers and nitrates for vasospasm.
• Conservative management of SCAD: Most dissections heal unaided; stenting is reserved for ongoing ischaemia. Screening for fibromuscular dysplasia follows.
• Pre-pregnancy counselling and pregnancy heart team care: Risk classification, medicine adjustment and a delivery plan for women with heart disease.
• Post-pregnancy follow-up: Blood pressure, weight and glucose checks after pre-eclampsia or gestational diabetes.
• Menopause advice: Hormone therapy is for symptom relief, not heart protection; timing and individual risk guide its safety.
• Cardio-oncology surveillance: Echo monitoring during anthracycline or trastuzumab therapy.
• Cardiac rehabilitation: Women are referred less often, yet benefit equally.

When to ask for a specialist opinion

• You have chest discomfort, breathlessness or unusual fatigue on exertion, even if previous tests were labelled normal
• You had pre-eclampsia, gestational diabetes or a preterm delivery and have never had a cardiovascular risk review
• You have heart disease and are planning a pregnancy
• You went through menopause before 45
• You had a heart attack or chest pain episode and were told your arteries are clear
• You are about to begin breast cancer treatment that can affect the heart

Travelling to Türkiye for this care

A focused assessment over 2 to 4 days, including CT, MRI or coronary function testing where indicated, can clarify a diagnosis that has been elusive at home, and gives you a written plan. Pregnancy-related heart care must stay with your local obstetric and cardiac team, and travel in late pregnancy or with unstable symptoms is inadvisable. Long-term risk management continues with your own doctor.

Send your reports, scans and a short history and a Clinic-Y coordinator replies within 24 hours with suitable teams and written, all-inclusive proposals side by side. Reviewing your case is free.

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