Women are more likely to survive a heart attack if they have a man by their side in hospital compared to those who are alone or accompanied by a female, experienced cardiologists have said.
A new study has found that hospital staff react more quickly to heart attack symptoms in women when they are with a man who is advocating for them.
NHS data shows that women are more at risk of dying from a cardiovascular complication than men.
In addition, women are twice as likely to be wrongly diagnosed and less likely to receive treatment quickly compared to men, the study has reported.
Latest research shows that women are more than 30% less likely to have an angiogram within three days of their symptoms first starting compared to men.
The findings also reveal that women are 3% less likely than men to have a stent fitted to restore blood flow.
According to the British Heart Foundation, more than 8,000 women in England and Wales between 2002 and 2013 died as a result of not receiving the same level of care as men.
Heart transplants and valve replacements are worse for women as they were originally trialled and tested on men, experts have said.
Prior studies also identify that women are less likely than men to be prescribed some drugs that can combat future heart attacks.
Symptoms of a heart attack in women include breathlessness, nausea, and pain in the back and between the shoulder blades.
With women presenting less obvious heart attack symptoms, healthcare professionals can struggle to detect the condition, therefore delaying treatment.
Women also misdiagnose themselves by thinking they have a chest infection or indigestion. Some women can also mistake it as a panic attack.
However, delaying the treatment time of a heart attack increases your death risk by 70%, the research reports. Previous studies show that twice as many women die of heart disease compared to cancer.
Dr Alyson McGregor said: “Women often have trouble convincing doctors how serious their pain is.
“The more a woman tries, the more their behaviour is perceived as hysterical and will be downgraded as typical female behaviour.”
