Monaco’s leading heart specialists are highlighting a critical healthcare inequality that continues to cost women’s lives: the gender gap in cardiovascular diagnosis and treatment.

The Monaco Women Network has organised a panel discussion on January 22nd bringing together four doctors from the Centre Cardio-Thoracique de Monaco to talk about an unfortunate reality – heart disease is the leading cause of death among women worldwide, yet female patients are routinely misdiagnosed or receive inadequate care.

The problem derives from decades of medical research focused primarily on men. As a result, doctors have been trained to recognise male symptoms and treatment protocols are designed around male physiology. For women, this can prove fatal.

The panel will explore why female heart attack symptoms often differ from those seen in men, making them harder to spot. Experts will also discuss how hormonal changes throughout women’s lives affect cardiovascular risk.

Conditions that often affect women, such as Takotsubo cardiomyopathy, commonly known as “broken heart syndrome”, will also be examined.

The discussion will be led by Dr Catherine Binet, anaesthesiologist and intensive care specialist, cardiologists Dr Hélène Ceruti and Dr Ariane Truffier and interventional cardiologist Dr Camille Wehrlin.

The event will take place on Thursday January 22nd at 6pm on the 10th floor of the Centre Cardio-Thoracique de Monaco, 11 bis Avenue d’Ostende. The discussion will be conducted in French with live English subtitles, followed by a networking cocktail reception

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Main photo credit: Monaco Women Forum