February 28, 2025 • 15 mins
We spoke with Dr. Heather Swales from the American Heart Association about heart health.
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Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
Good morning. Thank you for listening to Community Access today.
My guest is doctor Heather Swales from the American Heart
Association of Connecticut, which also works for Hertford Healthcare.
Speaker 2 (00:09):
Good morning, good morning, thanks for having me.
Speaker 1 (00:12):
You've bet February is American Heart month and unfortunately, cardiovascular
disease is one of the leading cause of death in women. Yes,
so for people who don't understand what exactly is cardiovascular.
Speaker 2 (00:25):
Disease, So, cardiovassor disease is any type of disease that
affects the heart or the blood vessels in the body.
Most people think of cardiovassor disease as coronary artery disease
where the blood vessels get blocked and is the leading
cause of heart attack in our country. But cardiovascular disease
(00:46):
is all encompassing and so it can include things like
stroke and high blood pressure. It can also include problems
with heart valves leaky or narrow valves, congenital heart disease,
or heart disease that you're born with, congestive heart failure,
abnormal heart rhythms. So it's pretty broad and expensive in
terms of what cardiovascar disease encompasses.
Speaker 1 (01:08):
What are some of the risk factors.
Speaker 2 (01:10):
The most common risk factors are things that many people
are aware of, such as high blood pressure, high cholesterol, diabetes, smoking,
but there are also other less commonly known and less
commonly affected things that cause it, like problems with pregnancy
(01:31):
in particular for women, or autoimmune conditions, or sometimes it's
nothing that you've done, or something that causes something that
you were just born with, related to possibly an issue
when you were in your mother's womb, or possibly related
to a genetic condition.
Speaker 1 (01:50):
That is very very interesting. Sometimes you said it's nothing
you could even do, It just happens to exist.
Speaker 2 (01:56):
Exactly what can we do?
Speaker 1 (01:58):
Though?
Speaker 2 (01:59):
So there are so many things that we can do
to impact our heart health. The big ones are no
smoking and avoidance of all second hand smoke, which is
actually often more dangerous than smoking itself if you're around
a lot of second hand smoke. Eating a healthy diet
that's high and fruits and vegetables, whole foods, lean proteins,
(02:23):
low and saturated fat is very important. Understanding what your
numbers are, so knowing what your blood pressure is and
working with your healthcare provider to make sure your blood
pressure is well controlled, and knowing what your blood sugar
and your blood cholesterol numbers are is also important, and
if you can't manage those just with lifestyle alone, it's
(02:45):
important to work with your healthcare provider to see if
medications are necessary to bring those numbers into goal. And
then also, maintaining a healthy body weight is really helpful,
and doing that through the healthy diet as well as
consistent exercise. And when we're talking about exercise, it's important
(03:05):
that you're incorporating both aerobic exercise as well as strength training.
Do you want to try to do strength training twice
a week and you want to try to get at
least a minimum of one hundred and fifty minutes of
moderate intensity aerobic exercise a week. And while that number
sounds overwhelming to some, if you break it down, it's
exercising five times a week for about thirty minutes. And
(03:26):
it can be as simple as putting on a good
pair of shoes and getting outside and walking. You don't
necessarily need to have a gym membership or fancy clothing
to do that.
Speaker 1 (03:35):
That's right, now, that's wonderful. Does age play a factor
at all?
Speaker 2 (03:40):
It does for all of us as we age our
body metabolism and body composition change, and so some of
our respectors can increase. We can see more prevalence of
high blood pressure. Cholesterol numbers often start to rise, particular
billion women after they go through menopause, and most of
(04:03):
us as we age unfortunately start to put on weight
and we become less active. So our lifestyle as we
age can have a big impact on our cardiovascular health.
Speaker 1 (04:13):
What are some heart attack warnings and are they different
for men and women?
Speaker 2 (04:18):
Yeah, that's a great question. So both men and women
on average have similar symptoms, the most common being some
type of discomfort in the chest, but men tend to
describe it differently and often feel it more intensely than women.
So men might describe it as a pain or pressure
or squeezing, and women often describe it as a tightness
(04:41):
or heaviness, and they also often describe it as being
more subtle and less intense. Both men and women can
have radiation of the pain spreading into their jaw, knapped back,
or arms, and it can be associated with gi sometimes
like nausea or even vomiting and ot and difficulty breathing.
(05:02):
But women can also feel symptoms like really intense indigestion,
and so they might think instead of having a heart attack,
it's just that they eat something bad for lunch. And
they may also have an overwhelming sense of fatigue. And
I think for a lot of women, because we are
often multitasking and managing an awful lot of things, we
(05:24):
feel tired a lot. And when we feel really tired,
we just think, well, I overdid it. You know, I've
been caring for my elderly parents, I still got kids
at home, I have a full time job. You know,
the bills are piling up, and I'm feeling stressed, and
so of course I'm feeling tired. So it's a common
thing for women to kind of ignore or minimize the
symptoms and often blame them on other things because they
(05:48):
often are not as intense or not as perceived as
intense as when men have the symptoms.
Speaker 1 (05:54):
And can stress be a factor.
Speaker 2 (05:57):
It certainly can. Emotional stress is a bigger respector for
heart disease and women compared with men, and work related
stress in some studies has been shown to be as
bad as smoking in terms of a respector for cardiovass
or disease, which is really amazing, and so it's really
(06:18):
important that people learn how to manage stress. Life is
stressful and we can't necessarily prevent the stress that's coming
down our road or predict when the next stressful event
is going to happen. But how you manage that stress
is really important and can have a big impact on
your cardiovass or health and as well as your recovery
(06:43):
if you do have a cardiovascular event. And so doing
things like exercise, meditation, mindless but mindfulness, talking to a
counselor those can be really great forms of stress relief.
And especially for women, having a social network, whether that's
family members that you can confide in and offer you support,
(07:03):
or friends, some type of network that gives you comfort
and support has been shown to really improve cardiovas or outcomes,
especially in women.
Speaker 1 (07:14):
And what should you do if you feel any of
those symptoms?
Speaker 2 (07:17):
Definitely talk to your healthcare provider. I think if you're
having symptoms that are new and unusual, most likely you
should be calling nine one one. Think about what you
would say to a friend if they called you and said,
I'm having these symptoms? What should I do? You'd probably
tell them we got to get you to the emergency
(07:37):
room or to urgent care right away because you could
be having a heart attack, and so it's really important
that you don't ignore it and kind of wait to
see what happens tomorrow. It's never wrong to be checked out.
That's what emergency rooms and urgent care centers are there for.
And it will be great news if nothing is wrong.
(07:58):
But if you come in and we find something, will
be so glad you came in. The sooner you get in,
the better your outcome is going to be, and the
more likely you are to survive and have a good recovery.
Speaker 1 (08:10):
What is Go Red for Women with the American Heart Association.
Speaker 2 (08:15):
So that's one of our big messages to help people
remember that heart disease is the leading cause of death
and women. And so in February, on the first Friday
of the month's Go Red Friday, and we encourage people
to wear red to call attention to and raise awareness
(08:37):
about the prevalence of heart disease in women. And that
you may have seen around little red dress pins that's
the symbol of heart disease and women from the American
Heart Association, And it's just to acknowledge that heart disease
is still a leading killer of women and the more
we can learn about it and educate with health care
(09:00):
providers as well as women in the general population. The
more people know about it, the more likely they're going
to seek help and get appropriate care to prevent heart
disease and improve outcomes.
Speaker 1 (09:13):
I think that's what it is. People say, I don't
want to go to the hospital because then I'll feel
silly if it's nothing. But you're better off going to
the hospital. God forbid, it is something.
Speaker 2 (09:22):
Absolutely, and I hear that all the time. For my patients,
they're very they're very courteous. They don't want to disturb
or bother anybody, and so they're very hesitant to seek
care because they don't want to be told it was
nothing and they don't want to have wasted anyone's time.
But I don't think any health care provider thinks it's
(09:42):
a waste of time. We love being able to give
good news and provide reassurance, and so if you're not
sure what to do, you know healthcare we all have
on call services, and so you can always call, even
if it's in the middle of the night. There's usually
a health care provider that can talk to you and
figure out is this truly an emergency. Do we need
(10:03):
to have you come into the emergency room or is
this something we can address tomorrow morning when the office
door is open, or at least when it by your
partner or your best friend. I don't think they'll ever
mind getting that phone call from you to talk through
some symptoms you're having. They'd much rather do that than
find out the next day that you had a really
(10:26):
bad outcome, you know, either a big heart attack or stroke,
or you've died at home because you were afraid to
get the help that you really needed.
Speaker 1 (10:35):
And a panic attack can actually feel like a heart attack, correct, actor, it.
Speaker 2 (10:38):
Can, absolutely so. The symptoms can be very similar, and
so it can be difficult to know, and that's why
you need to seek medical attension in medical care, because
they're going to need to do an exam, they're going
to need to do some testing to try to figure
out what exactly is going on. I don't think you
can know for sure by yourself, and so I think
(11:01):
it's that's where talking to a healthcare provider is really helpful,
because they have extra tools and knowledge to try to
figure out what exactly is going on.
Speaker 1 (11:11):
Can heart health affect different ethnicities differently.
Speaker 2 (11:16):
Yes, it can, so depending on what specific heart disease
you're talking about, we do see differences both in gender
as well as ethnicities and races. And when we're talking
about stroke, for example, we see a much higher incidence
of stroke and non Hispanic African Americans, followed by non
(11:38):
non Hispanic whites, with Hispanic Whites and Asians having the
lowest incidents. And similarly, when we're talking about coronary artery disease,
we see higher incidences in non Hispanic African Americans as well.
So it's really important for all people to be aware
(12:02):
of the signs and symptoms and be doing all of
the things they can to try to reduce their risk factors,
but especially for non Hispanic African Americans to be talking
with their healthcare providers so they can be proactive because
so much of heart disease can be prevented and or
managed well to improve your overall ability to function and
(12:23):
your long term survival.
Speaker 1 (12:25):
You mentioned stroke, let's talk about those symptoms and men
and women.
Speaker 2 (12:30):
Yeah, so the common ones that we think about are
facial asymmetry where when you look in the mirror, one
side of your face is a little bit droopy, compared
with the other side. The other big one is arm weakness.
So if you lift both arms up towards the ceiling,
one of the arms kind of risks downward, while the
(12:53):
good arm is able to hold itself up towards the ceiling.
And the third most common symptom is speech difficulty, either
having trouble finding the words but you know, you know
what you want to say, but it's all garbley gook
coming out of your mouth, or you are kind of
(13:16):
just making nonsensical. Nothing is making sense when you're talking,
So those are common in men and women. Sometimes trouble
walking can be there, especially if you're having the asymmetry
and the arms that can also affect the legs. But
again a difference between men and women is that women
sometimes when they're having a stroke, the symptoms can be
(13:39):
more subtle, and one of their main symptoms may be
extreme fatigue. They may have nausea and vomiting again, and
they may feel or they may act confused or have
trouble with their memory. Those symptoms are less common.
Speaker 1 (13:54):
In men, and stroke and heart attack can affect anybody
at any age at any time.
Speaker 2 (14:01):
Correct they tend to be diseases that affect people in
older ages above fifty for men and above sixty for women.
But stroke is one of the leading causes of mortality
for pregnant moms, so young women. So that is really scary,
(14:24):
and that comes down to refectors that can happen around
the time of pregnancy and immediately post delivery. But that's
absolutely correct. We see heart attacks and young individuals not
as often as well as strokes, but most strokes and
heart attacks do occur in middle to older ages.
Speaker 1 (14:44):
I'm speaking with doctor Heather Swales from the American Heart
Association of Connecticut. She also works at Hartford Healthcare. It
is February American Heart Month. If you'd like more information,
you just can go to heart dot org. Thank you
so much for being with us today, for all of
the amazing work you do and for caring for people.
Speaker 2 (15:03):
Thank you
Good morning. Thank you for listening to Community Access today.
My guest is doctor Heather Swales from the American Heart
Association of Connecticut, which also works for Hertford Healthcare.
Speaker 2 (00:09):
Good morning, good morning, thanks for having me.
Speaker 1 (00:12):
You've bet February is American Heart month and unfortunately, cardiovascular
disease is one of the leading cause of death in women. Yes,
so for people who don't understand what exactly is cardiovascular.
Speaker 2 (00:25):
Disease, So, cardiovassor disease is any type of disease that
affects the heart or the blood vessels in the body.
Most people think of cardiovassor disease as coronary artery disease
where the blood vessels get blocked and is the leading
cause of heart attack in our country. But cardiovascular disease
(00:46):
is all encompassing and so it can include things like
stroke and high blood pressure. It can also include problems
with heart valves leaky or narrow valves, congenital heart disease,
or heart disease that you're born with, congestive heart failure,
abnormal heart rhythms. So it's pretty broad and expensive in
terms of what cardiovascar disease encompasses.
Speaker 1 (01:08):
What are some of the risk factors.
Speaker 2 (01:10):
The most common risk factors are things that many people
are aware of, such as high blood pressure, high cholesterol, diabetes, smoking,
but there are also other less commonly known and less
commonly affected things that cause it, like problems with pregnancy
(01:31):
in particular for women, or autoimmune conditions, or sometimes it's
nothing that you've done, or something that causes something that
you were just born with, related to possibly an issue
when you were in your mother's womb, or possibly related
to a genetic condition.
Speaker 1 (01:50):
That is very very interesting. Sometimes you said it's nothing
you could even do, It just happens to exist.
Speaker 2 (01:56):
Exactly what can we do?
Speaker 1 (01:58):
Though?
Speaker 2 (01:59):
So there are so many things that we can do
to impact our heart health. The big ones are no
smoking and avoidance of all second hand smoke, which is
actually often more dangerous than smoking itself if you're around
a lot of second hand smoke. Eating a healthy diet
that's high and fruits and vegetables, whole foods, lean proteins,
(02:23):
low and saturated fat is very important. Understanding what your
numbers are, so knowing what your blood pressure is and
working with your healthcare provider to make sure your blood
pressure is well controlled, and knowing what your blood sugar
and your blood cholesterol numbers are is also important, and
if you can't manage those just with lifestyle alone, it's
(02:45):
important to work with your healthcare provider to see if
medications are necessary to bring those numbers into goal. And
then also, maintaining a healthy body weight is really helpful,
and doing that through the healthy diet as well as
consistent exercise. And when we're talking about exercise, it's important
(03:05):
that you're incorporating both aerobic exercise as well as strength training.
Do you want to try to do strength training twice
a week and you want to try to get at
least a minimum of one hundred and fifty minutes of
moderate intensity aerobic exercise a week. And while that number
sounds overwhelming to some, if you break it down, it's
exercising five times a week for about thirty minutes. And
(03:26):
it can be as simple as putting on a good
pair of shoes and getting outside and walking. You don't
necessarily need to have a gym membership or fancy clothing
to do that.
Speaker 1 (03:35):
That's right, now, that's wonderful. Does age play a factor
at all?
Speaker 2 (03:40):
It does for all of us as we age our
body metabolism and body composition change, and so some of
our respectors can increase. We can see more prevalence of
high blood pressure. Cholesterol numbers often start to rise, particular
billion women after they go through menopause, and most of
(04:03):
us as we age unfortunately start to put on weight
and we become less active. So our lifestyle as we
age can have a big impact on our cardiovascular health.
Speaker 1 (04:13):
What are some heart attack warnings and are they different
for men and women?
Speaker 2 (04:18):
Yeah, that's a great question. So both men and women
on average have similar symptoms, the most common being some
type of discomfort in the chest, but men tend to
describe it differently and often feel it more intensely than women.
So men might describe it as a pain or pressure
or squeezing, and women often describe it as a tightness
(04:41):
or heaviness, and they also often describe it as being
more subtle and less intense. Both men and women can
have radiation of the pain spreading into their jaw, knapped back,
or arms, and it can be associated with gi sometimes
like nausea or even vomiting and ot and difficulty breathing.
(05:02):
But women can also feel symptoms like really intense indigestion,
and so they might think instead of having a heart attack,
it's just that they eat something bad for lunch. And
they may also have an overwhelming sense of fatigue. And
I think for a lot of women, because we are
often multitasking and managing an awful lot of things, we
(05:24):
feel tired a lot. And when we feel really tired,
we just think, well, I overdid it. You know, I've
been caring for my elderly parents, I still got kids
at home, I have a full time job. You know,
the bills are piling up, and I'm feeling stressed, and
so of course I'm feeling tired. So it's a common
thing for women to kind of ignore or minimize the
symptoms and often blame them on other things because they
(05:48):
often are not as intense or not as perceived as
intense as when men have the symptoms.
Speaker 1 (05:54):
And can stress be a factor.
Speaker 2 (05:57):
It certainly can. Emotional stress is a bigger respector for
heart disease and women compared with men, and work related
stress in some studies has been shown to be as
bad as smoking in terms of a respector for cardiovass
or disease, which is really amazing, and so it's really
(06:18):
important that people learn how to manage stress. Life is
stressful and we can't necessarily prevent the stress that's coming
down our road or predict when the next stressful event
is going to happen. But how you manage that stress
is really important and can have a big impact on
your cardiovass or health and as well as your recovery
(06:43):
if you do have a cardiovascular event. And so doing
things like exercise, meditation, mindless but mindfulness, talking to a
counselor those can be really great forms of stress relief.
And especially for women, having a social network, whether that's
family members that you can confide in and offer you support,
(07:03):
or friends, some type of network that gives you comfort
and support has been shown to really improve cardiovas or outcomes,
especially in women.
Speaker 1 (07:14):
And what should you do if you feel any of
those symptoms?
Speaker 2 (07:17):
Definitely talk to your healthcare provider. I think if you're
having symptoms that are new and unusual, most likely you
should be calling nine one one. Think about what you
would say to a friend if they called you and said,
I'm having these symptoms? What should I do? You'd probably
tell them we got to get you to the emergency
(07:37):
room or to urgent care right away because you could
be having a heart attack, and so it's really important
that you don't ignore it and kind of wait to
see what happens tomorrow. It's never wrong to be checked out.
That's what emergency rooms and urgent care centers are there for.
And it will be great news if nothing is wrong.
(07:58):
But if you come in and we find something, will
be so glad you came in. The sooner you get in,
the better your outcome is going to be, and the
more likely you are to survive and have a good recovery.
Speaker 1 (08:10):
What is Go Red for Women with the American Heart Association.
Speaker 2 (08:15):
So that's one of our big messages to help people
remember that heart disease is the leading cause of death
and women. And so in February, on the first Friday
of the month's Go Red Friday, and we encourage people
to wear red to call attention to and raise awareness
(08:37):
about the prevalence of heart disease in women. And that
you may have seen around little red dress pins that's
the symbol of heart disease and women from the American
Heart Association, And it's just to acknowledge that heart disease
is still a leading killer of women and the more
we can learn about it and educate with health care
(09:00):
providers as well as women in the general population. The
more people know about it, the more likely they're going
to seek help and get appropriate care to prevent heart
disease and improve outcomes.
Speaker 1 (09:13):
I think that's what it is. People say, I don't
want to go to the hospital because then I'll feel
silly if it's nothing. But you're better off going to
the hospital. God forbid, it is something.
Speaker 2 (09:22):
Absolutely, and I hear that all the time. For my patients,
they're very they're very courteous. They don't want to disturb
or bother anybody, and so they're very hesitant to seek
care because they don't want to be told it was
nothing and they don't want to have wasted anyone's time.
But I don't think any health care provider thinks it's
(09:42):
a waste of time. We love being able to give
good news and provide reassurance, and so if you're not
sure what to do, you know healthcare we all have
on call services, and so you can always call, even
if it's in the middle of the night. There's usually
a health care provider that can talk to you and
figure out is this truly an emergency. Do we need
(10:03):
to have you come into the emergency room or is
this something we can address tomorrow morning when the office
door is open, or at least when it by your
partner or your best friend. I don't think they'll ever
mind getting that phone call from you to talk through
some symptoms you're having. They'd much rather do that than
find out the next day that you had a really
(10:26):
bad outcome, you know, either a big heart attack or stroke,
or you've died at home because you were afraid to
get the help that you really needed.
Speaker 1 (10:35):
And a panic attack can actually feel like a heart attack, correct, actor, it.
Speaker 2 (10:38):
Can, absolutely so. The symptoms can be very similar, and
so it can be difficult to know, and that's why
you need to seek medical attension in medical care, because
they're going to need to do an exam, they're going
to need to do some testing to try to figure
out what exactly is going on. I don't think you
can know for sure by yourself, and so I think
(11:01):
it's that's where talking to a healthcare provider is really helpful,
because they have extra tools and knowledge to try to
figure out what exactly is going on.
Speaker 1 (11:11):
Can heart health affect different ethnicities differently.
Speaker 2 (11:16):
Yes, it can, so depending on what specific heart disease
you're talking about, we do see differences both in gender
as well as ethnicities and races. And when we're talking
about stroke, for example, we see a much higher incidence
of stroke and non Hispanic African Americans, followed by non
(11:38):
non Hispanic whites, with Hispanic Whites and Asians having the
lowest incidents. And similarly, when we're talking about coronary artery disease,
we see higher incidences in non Hispanic African Americans as well.
So it's really important for all people to be aware
(12:02):
of the signs and symptoms and be doing all of
the things they can to try to reduce their risk factors,
but especially for non Hispanic African Americans to be talking
with their healthcare providers so they can be proactive because
so much of heart disease can be prevented and or
managed well to improve your overall ability to function and
(12:23):
your long term survival.
Speaker 1 (12:25):
You mentioned stroke, let's talk about those symptoms and men
and women.
Speaker 2 (12:30):
Yeah, so the common ones that we think about are
facial asymmetry where when you look in the mirror, one
side of your face is a little bit droopy, compared
with the other side. The other big one is arm weakness.
So if you lift both arms up towards the ceiling,
one of the arms kind of risks downward, while the
(12:53):
good arm is able to hold itself up towards the ceiling.
And the third most common symptom is speech difficulty, either
having trouble finding the words but you know, you know
what you want to say, but it's all garbley gook
coming out of your mouth, or you are kind of
(13:16):
just making nonsensical. Nothing is making sense when you're talking,
So those are common in men and women. Sometimes trouble
walking can be there, especially if you're having the asymmetry
and the arms that can also affect the legs. But
again a difference between men and women is that women
sometimes when they're having a stroke, the symptoms can be
(13:39):
more subtle, and one of their main symptoms may be
extreme fatigue. They may have nausea and vomiting again, and
they may feel or they may act confused or have
trouble with their memory. Those symptoms are less common.
Speaker 1 (13:54):
In men, and stroke and heart attack can affect anybody
at any age at any time.
Speaker 2 (14:01):
Correct they tend to be diseases that affect people in
older ages above fifty for men and above sixty for women.
But stroke is one of the leading causes of mortality
for pregnant moms, so young women. So that is really scary,
(14:24):
and that comes down to refectors that can happen around
the time of pregnancy and immediately post delivery. But that's
absolutely correct. We see heart attacks and young individuals not
as often as well as strokes, but most strokes and
heart attacks do occur in middle to older ages.
Speaker 1 (14:44):
I'm speaking with doctor Heather Swales from the American Heart
Association of Connecticut. She also works at Hartford Healthcare. It
is February American Heart Month. If you'd like more information,
you just can go to heart dot org. Thank you
so much for being with us today, for all of
the amazing work you do and for caring for people.
Speaker 2 (15:03):
Thank you
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