Abstract

Did you know that your sex can change the way your body responds to disease? We wanted to know how the female body responds to serious heart problems. To do this, we looked through previous studies on heart disease. We tracked how many people died in the 30 days after we knew their heart wasn’t working well. Did female patients die more than male patients? Unfortunately, we found that they did. We think this could be because a higher percentage of female patients had the most serious condition, heart failure, after a heart attack. Heart failure means your heart isn’t pumping enough blood. However, we don’t understand exactly why there’s a difference between the sexes. If we can work this out, then doctors may be able to provide better treatment for their patients.