According to Bonnie Arkus, the founder and volunteer executive director of the Women's Heart Foundation since 1992, the group has spearheaded a movement that has now grown to include a national coalition of health organizations with a mission of promoting heart wellness and awareness in women, including The Heart Truth, a campaign sponsored by the NIH National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute with which it has partnered.
The Foundation has identified the seven areas of focus for women to help identify heart health as risk and symptoms awareness, exercise and fitness, holistic health, medication safety, self image, healthcare self-management and nutrition.
"Our mandate is to share that heart disease is not just a man's disease, and to educate women and health professionals about how heart disease affects women differently," says Arkus. "The Women's Heart Foundation has been a leading advocate for gender-separation of outcomes for invasive heart procedures and for raising awareness about symptoms that differ in women. This critical area of women's health is finally getting the attention it deserves," she said.
Arkus said that three medical journals reported in December that outcomes for women with heart disease are improving and gave credit to women's heart advocacy groups for the changes in practice. The articles state that women with heart disease are being more carefully managed, diabetic blood sugars more tightly controlled, and technology more strategically utilized.
Improvements in medicines, advancements in the design of instruments to better accommodate the female anatomy and smaller arteries and fewer emergency open-heart bypass operations are other positive changes that confer a better survival rate in women. In addition to New Jersey, which issued a state proclamation in 1994, the states that have issued state proclamations for Women's Heart Week are Pennsylvania (1995), Delaware (1996), New York (1996), Maryland (1996), Washington (1998), New Mexico (1999), Virginia (1999), California (1999), Michigan (1999), Missouri (1999),South Carolina (2001), Rhode Island (2001), Indiana (2001), Massachusetts (2001), Ohio (2001) and Georgia (2001).
The Women's Heart Foundation is a public-supported charity dedicated to improving survival and quality of life for women with heart disease.