Treatment for Women's Heart Disease

Doctors may recommend different methods of treatment including lifestyle changes, medicine, medical and surgical procedures, or cardiac rehabilitation.

Lifestyle changes:

• Quit smoking
• Follow a healthy diet and maintain a healthy weight
• Be physically active
• Manage stress and depression

Medicines can also be used as treatment if lifestyle changes aren’t enough. Medicines can help reduce your heart’s workload, decrease your chance of heart attack, prevent blood clots and possibly the need for surgery.

If it comes time that your doctor recommends a procedure, angioplasty and coronary artery bypass grafting will likely be your options. Angioplasty is a nonsurgical procedure that opens blocked coronary arteries. During a coronary artery bypass grafting (CABG), the surgeon takes arteries and veins from other parts of the body and repositions them to bypass the narrow or blocked artery.

Another option for treatment is cardiac rehabilitation. This likely will be recommended after a procedure or cardiac event. It is a medically supervised program designed to help people with heart conditions recover. It may include exercise training and education and counseling.

Learn more about the Women's Cardiac Center at the Lifespan Cardiovascular Institute