Title: Recognizing women's cardiovascular health as a critical health care priority that affects every State and contributes to increased health care costs, and promoting the necessity of increased awareness of and education on the symptoms for heart disease among women, gender-specific cardiovascular disease research, and policy action to alleviate the risks of heart disease among women.
Policy area: Health

Summary:
This resolution identifies women's cardiovascular health as an important health care issue. It recognizes that gender-specific differences in symptoms can impact health outcomes and costs, promotes increased awareness of these differences, and supports gender-specific cardiovascular health research, prevention, and treatment.

[Congressional Bills 116th Congress]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office]
[H. Res. 643 Introduced in House (IH)]

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116th CONGRESS
  1st Session
H. RES. 643

  Recognizing women's cardiovascular health as a critical health care 
 priority that affects every State and contributes to increased health 
 care costs, and promoting the necessity of increased awareness of and 
    education on the symptoms for heart disease among women, gender-
    specific cardiovascular disease research, and policy action to 
           alleviate the risks of heart disease among women.


_______________________________________________________________________


                    IN THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES

                            October 18, 2019

 Ms. Herrera Beutler (for herself and Ms. Roybal-Allard) submitted the 
following resolution; which was referred to the Committee on Energy and 
                                Commerce

_______________________________________________________________________

                               RESOLUTION


 
  Recognizing women's cardiovascular health as a critical health care 
 priority that affects every State and contributes to increased health 
 care costs, and promoting the necessity of increased awareness of and 
    education on the symptoms for heart disease among women, gender-
    specific cardiovascular disease research, and policy action to 
           alleviate the risks of heart disease among women.

Whereas heart disease is the number one killer of women in the United States;
Whereas heart disease accounts for the deaths of 400,000 women each year or 
        1,080 each day;
Whereas one in three women die of heart disease or stroke;
Whereas the symptoms of heart disease and heart attack among women are different 
        from those among men;
Whereas the maternal mortality rate in the United States is rising with more 
        than 700 women dying from pregnancy-related conditions each year, and 
        cardiac disease and stroke, the leading cause of pregnancy-related 
        deaths in the United States, is responsible for approximately 34 percent 
        of these losses;
Whereas unrecognized symptoms and inadequate treatment of cardiovascular disease 
        among women contribute to the increasing costs to the United States 
        health care system, which, if left unaddressed, are projected to surpass 
        $1 trillion by 2035;
Whereas heart attack symptoms among women are not typically recognized and can 
        be as subtle as fatigue, jaw pain, shortness of breath, backache, and 
        indigestion;
Whereas half of all women experiencing heart attacks display none of the 
        typically recognized male symptoms;
Whereas 64 percent of women who die of coronary heart disease show no prior 
        typically recognized symptoms;
Whereas women are 50 percent more likely to receive an incorrect diagnosis 
        following a heart attack;
Whereas despite gender differences in physiology and the manifestation of 
        cardiovascular disease, women comprise only 34 percent of participants 
        in cardiovascular disease studies that enroll both men and women; and
Whereas even when considering all cardiovascular disease-related studies, 
        including single-sex studies, women still comprise only 41 percent of 
        participants: Now, therefore, be it
    Resolved, That the House of Representatives--
            (1) recognizes the vital importance of decreasing 
        cardiovascular disease among women;
            (2) promotes the necessity of raising awareness of the 
        preventable ubiquity of cardiovascular mortality among women, 
        and urges a comprehensive public awareness initiative that 
        establishes best practices for identifying and treating 
        cardiovascular incidents in women, specifically;
            (3) supports efforts to educate women, men, patients, and 
        physicians about the critical differences of cardiovascular 
        disease symptoms between women and men;
            (4) supports the promotion of gender-specific 
        cardiovascular health research, prevention, and treatment, 
        because--
                    (A) there is a material difference in the way women 
                present with cardiovascular or heart attack symptoms; 
                and
                    (B) gender-specific cardiovascular research is 
                essential to driving successful positive outcomes in 
                the reduction of mortality rates;
            (5) affirms the connection between cardiovascular disease 
        and preeclampsia in new mothers;
            (6) acknowledges that the costs to the health care system 
        of unrecognized symptoms in the treatment of women can be 
        substantially reduced with appropriate public policy; and
            (7) supports the development of economic impact data to 
        ascertain the health care system costs to be saved by 
        decreasing the incidents of death due to unrecognized symptoms 
        of heart attack in women.
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