Care for Women’s Heart Disease

The team approach – With inspiration from Heart Help for Women and encouragement from one another, Jean Parkansky (left) and her mother, Nancy Mazzarese, both of Forks Township, Pa., go biking, walking and shopping together to stay heart healthy.

As a women, you are so good at putting other people first – your family, your parents, your friends – that you often don’t make time to take care of yourself. When it comes to your heart, Lehigh Valley Health Network has a program to support you.

Heart Help for Women is a program for women and their physicians designed to:

• Increase awareness of your risk for heart disease
• Make sure you know the symptoms of a heart attack and the importance of calling 9-1-1 immediately when symptoms arise

• Encourage you to work with your doctors to manage your risk factors and get appropriate diagnostic testing and treatment

We also help you connect with the right doctor – one who understands what makes women’s heart care different than men’s. These doctors voluntarily receive additional education that doctors at other hospitals don’t receive. It makes them aware of a woman’s risks and symptoms and allows them to treat her most effectively.

Heart Help for Women hosts special events throughout the community. You can talk directly with a panel of specialists about heart health and ask questions about taking care of yourself to ensure you’re healthy enough to take care of the ones you love.

We bring in motivational speakers like Phylicia Rashad, whose father died of heart disease and diabetes, and Jackie Kallen, the world’s most successful female boxing manager, who had a stent implanted in her heart. We also encourage women to bring their mothers, daughters, sisters, girlfriends and even the special men in their lives, so everyone understands how to take care of their heart.

This page last updated 9/25/09 02:35 PM