A new investigation, the results of which were published in JAMA Internal Medicine, examined sex-specific chest pain characteristics in early diagnoses of a heart attack.  The goal of the study was to evaluate whether or not female-specific symptoms could be used to differentiate the early stages of a heart attack from other chest pains.  Researchers looked at over 2,400 consecutive cases at 9 emergency departments where patients presented with acute chest pain.  The study found that there were few sex-specific differences in the early stages of a heart attack, when the individual is primarily experiencing chest pain only.  Thus, the use of female-specific diagnostic criteria at this point would be of little value.

This research expanded on established evidence that men and women experience different heart attack symptoms.  According to WebMD, commonly known symptoms of a heart attack are squeezing chest pain, shortness of breath, and a crushing chest pain that radiates down one arm.  However, these are more often seen in male victims.  Females experience subtler or less obviously related symptoms, such as pain in seemingly unrelated areas including the back, neck, jaw, and stomach.  Women also experience a fatigued feeling, primarily in the chest, which makes simple physical exertion difficult.

Subtle symptoms of a heart attack make it difficult to identify.  With other sources of chest pain, NBC News states that sex-specific criteria in the early stages of a heart attack could help provide a quicker method for evaluating heart-attack symptoms in women could help to detect problems sooner, as well as reduce heart-attack misdiagnosis and death rates, both of which tend to be higher in women than in men.

According to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), approximately 715,000 Americans have a heart attack each year.  Of these, 525,000 are a first attack and 190,000 have already had a heart attack before.  The CDC also interviewed Americans to identify if there was a lack of education on heart attacks.  Respondents knew that chest pain was a major symptom of a heart attack, but did not know that chest discomfort, other upper body pains, shortness of breath, nausea, lightheadedness, and cold sweats were also major symptoms that could signal a need to call 911.  With 47 percent of sudden cardiac deaths occurring outside of a hospital, the CDC concluded that many Americans do not know when it is time to seek emergency medical care.