Analia Loria: This event today is the Healthy Heart for Women symposium.
It is a big institutional commitment from the NIH and American Heart to raise awareness
about cardiovascular risk in woman, so we want to replicate this at the University of
Kentucky by bringing to the table ongoing research, therapies in development.
Frédérique Yiannikouris: Our symposium; Healthy Hearts for Woman, is bringing together
outstanding scientists from different university to talk and to address new scientific advance,
but as well, translational aspect that cardiovascular field can explore.
Our symposium is focused on sex difference because sex difference exist.
And it's very important to understanding underlying mechanism to offer better and more adapted treatment.
And we are thinking it's going to make a huge difference in term of human health outcome.
Lisa Cassis: I think it's like quite amazing that we have these two very innovate junior
faculty members who spear headed this here at the University of Kentucky;
Analia and Frederique.
And it's now in its fourth year, and they pretty much did it from their grass roots
- just dedication to the effort.
So, please join me in thanking them for doing this for us.
Susan Smyth: Here at the University of Kentucky, we are incredibly fortunate to have two pioneering
women in the cardiovascular field and leadership positions; the Vice President for Research,
Dr. Lisa Cassis, who has led the field around how people develop aneurysms, and Dean Donna
Arnett, who heads Public Health and is a former president of the American Heart Association.
They provide phenomenal role models for all of us as women in the cardiovascular field.
That said, there are areas where we really could use more women.
So, when we look at cardiology, so women physicians who manage heart conditions.
When we look at cardiac surgeons, women who practice surgery on the heart, we are woefully lacking.
Role models like Dr. Cassis and Dean Arnett in those high visibility positions, really
does help increase the pipeline of women thinking about medicine and science as a career.
Donna Arnett: 90% or more of us have one or more risk factors for heart disease.
And women have a higher lifetime risk of stroke than men.
And I think most importantly, and the reason that I have such passion around maintaining
health, particularly related to cardiovascular disease, is that 80% of the heart attacks
and strokes that exist today could be prevented by lifestyle changes and control of risk factors.
Frank Mauvais-Jarvis: This is a meeting about the heart of women and diabetes is the single
most important factor that eliminates the female protection against heart disease compared to men.
If you look at the large, randomized controlled trials that have looked at the effect of estrogens
in menopausal women, the delay, the protection against diabetes is the second most powerful
effect after the protection of bone loss - osteoporosis.
Virginia Miller: when we think about how a woman's body functions, she has the capability
of getting pregnant and carrying a baby to term, and her body and cardiovascular system
must adapt to that.
And that ability to adapt really puts her at different risk for cardiovascular disease
compared to men.
I was interested in studying the cells that line the blood vessels, called the endothelium,
and we know that hormones affect those cells.
So we started studying estrogen and how estrogen affects the blood vessels, and the blood vessels
are a key part of [the] development of atherosclerosis and cardiovascular disease.
And, I came to realize, that we knew so little about the cardiovascular system of women - that
it became very important to me to advocate that research be done for women to understand
their specific risk and reduce their burden of disease as they age.
Jill Barnes: I'm interested in how humans age, and how we - the physiological changes
that occur with aging.
What happens is that men and women age differently.
And these differences, even if we're studying this in healthy men and women, have implications
for future risk of disease.
And so I thought that was very fascinating; that you could take a healthy person and evaluate
some of these responses to stress and how blood pressure changes to those stress, and
that that might be indicative of future risk 10 years, 20 years later.
Susan Smyth: So, when I speak with my patients about the things that they can do to improve
their heart health, I talk about the Simple Seven from the American Heart Association.
So that is; maintain ideal blood pressure, watch your cholesterol, maintain an ideal
body weight, be sure that you're getting regular physical activity - ideally that's 30 minutes
of rigorous, vigorous activity each day - watch your blood sugar levels, watch what you're
eating, and really, in Kentucky probably most importantly, because it is the most preventable
cause of heart disease in the country, is not to smoke.
And so anything we can do to help people either quit or prevent them from starting smoking
is paramount.