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WOMEN at the heart of our congresses

Sessions about women's issues at the European Society of Cardiology congresses

Today is International Women’s Day...2011 marked its centenary celebration…100 years! It all started in 1911 to promote solidarity in acquiring equal economic, political, and social rights for women which would reflect and embrace their changing roles in society.  Much like our congresses, every year is a unique theme and highlight and hundreds of events take place worldwide throughout March.  Also, find out more about the ESC's Women at Heart initiative, to help us spread these messages and ensure women have access to the same level of care as men.  You may like to access a selection of articlesrelated to women and gender-specific issues in cardiology. 

   

Assessing women's cardiovascular risk
 
Cardiovascular disease in women, their specific symptoms in presenting myocardial infarction and the Women at Heart initiative have been brought to you in a previous volume of the e-Journal, in 2006. Since, the ESC/EACPR 2007 guidelines have exposed the misleading or incomplete...(An article from the E-Journal of the ESC Council for Cardiology Practice)  Read full article...

Pregnancy and Cardiovascular Disease

12th Annual Spring Meeting on Cardiovascular Nursing 
16 - 17 March 2012, Copenhagen - Denmark

  • It will be the age, elderly women and heartfailure.  More details 
  • Does the severity of pain in acute myocardial infarction is different between women and men? More details
  • Risk factors of cardiovascular diseases in women after menopause. More details
  • Drug secondary prevention in postmenopausal women with ischemic stroke more. More details 
  • Are there gender differences in post cardiac surgery rehabilitation?  More details
  • Is gender associated with survival after in-hospital cardiac arrest? Poster. More details
  • Gender differences in pre-hospital delay times in acute coronary syndrome. Poster. More details

Frontiers in CardioVascular Biology
30 March - 01 April 2012, London - England

  • Lipid tetrad index and lipid pentad index are lower in women? More details
  • The use of erythrocyte indices for diagnosis of left ventricular hypertrophy in hypertensive women. More details
  • Risk factors of cardiovascular diseases in women after menopause. More details
  • Apolipoprotein CIII is related to endothelial dysfunction and endothelial progenitor cells in obese women. More details

EuroPRevent
03 - 05 May 2012 , Dublin - Ireland 

  • Hypertension in pregnancy. What we need to know.  More details

Poster Sessions

  • Parity as emerging risk factor for hypertension in perimenopausal women.  More details
  • Assessment of selected cardiovascular risk factors prevalence among women living in rural areas and big cities in Poland.  More details
  • Diet quality, insulin resistance and risk of type 2 diabetes in middle-aged men and women: results from the Cork and Kerry diabetes and heart disease study.  More details
  • Cardiovascular combined exercise training in patients with chronic ischemic heart disease: differences between men and women.  More details
  • Impact of different cardiac rehabilitation programmes on exertion tolerance, quality of life and depression in women with ischemic heart disease.  More details
  • Lp(a) is an independent risk factor for coronary heart disease in men and women: a matched pair analysis in 32.000 patients.  More details
  • Smoking is risk factor of perioperative cardiovascular events in women undergoing abdominal surgery.  More details
  • Health-related behaviors and diet quality of Polish women in procreative age in the context of the cardiovascular risk.  More details
  • Relation between high sensitivity C-reactive protein and intima media thickness in middle aged men and women.  More details
  • Conventional cardiovascular risk factors and their prognostic role in a cohort of post-menopausal women. The long-term follow-up of the "Bene Essere Donna" patients.  More details
  • Incidence of lone atrial fibrillation in men and women after long practice of the breath hold and/or SCUBA diving.  More details
  • Men but not women are at risk for myocardial infarction after episodic sexual activity: a review of literature.  More details
  • 5-year mortality in respondents and non-respondent for the cohort study of 20 000 randomly selected middle aged men and women. The HAPIEE Project.  More details
  • Detection frequency of carotid artery plaques in men and women with low and moderate cardiovascular risk according to SCORE scale.  More details
  • Women with stable angina and similar coronary artery disease as men are less likely to be revascularized.  More details
  • Smoking in women has the strongest impact on arterial stiffness in menopausal transition.  More details

 

Heart Failure 
19 - 22 May 2012 - Belgrade - Serbia

  • New biomarkers for diagnosis and risk stratification of women with heart disease in pregnancy.  More details
  • Multi-media approach implementing cutting-edge technology into educational and preventative health programme in women.  More details
  • Definition and epidemiology of pregnancy-associated heart disease.  More details
  • How to approach, treat and manage pregnancy associated heart disease.  More details

ESC Congress
25 -29 August 2012,  Munich - Germany

Find out about ESC’s Women at Heart Programme

Since 2005, when the ESC  launched the “Women at Heart” programme it has been active in promoting research into the specific problems relating to cardiovascular disease (CVD) in women, and in spreading awareness among both health professionals and the public, that CVD is the most important cause of death in women. “The problem we identified is that if physicians see women aged 55 to 60 years with atypical symptoms in the emergency room they don’t automatically think of heart attacks,” says Marco Stramba-Badiale, an international expert on women and heart disease who has chaired many of the Women at Heart policy conferences.

The first “Women at Heart” initiative was a policy conference on CVD in women, held in Nice in June 2005, that set out to identify scientific gaps in research on CVD in women, and formulate strategies to change misperceptions. The conference gave rise to a policy statement summarising the state of CVD in women, with recommendations to increase awareness of CVD in women and representation of women in clinical trials.

Next, a joint conference was organised by the ESC with the European Heart Network (an alliance of heart foundations), held in Brussels in March 2006, where the scientific community discussed the issue of CVD with representatives from the European parliament, national ministries of health and national patient foundations.  The conference, held under the auspices of the Austrian Council Presidency, recommended that gender specific aspects should be promoted by the European Union and that dedicated research funding should be made available to advance gender-specific medicine.

In 2007 a third conference was held in Sophia Antipolis between the ESC and The European Society of Menopause in recognition of the fact gynaecologists have an important role to play in evaluating women for CVD around the time of menopause. A simplified Euro Heart Score, which predicts a woman’s risk of dying from a cardiovascular event over the next 10 years, was devised for use by gynaecologists, that takes into account blood pressure, cholesterol, whether the subject is a smoker, the presence of central obesity and fasting hyperglycaemia.

“The menopause is a very important time because many women who haven’t had any risks for CVD increase their risks due to decreasing oestrogen being associated with increased blood pressure and cholesterol,” says Stramba-Badiale, adding that gynaecologists who see women around this time are well placed to undertake assessments.