Why is it important to understand my unique risks?
Dr. Bastiany explains how pregnancy, menopause and postmenopause can affect your heart and brain health.
Women’s risk factors
Know your risks
As women, we face unique risk factors for heart disease and stroke at different points in our lives.
A risk factor is something that increases your likelihood of developing a condition or disease. While aging increases risk for heart disease and stroke, women face unique risk factors at every life stage. Knowing your risks is the first step in managing them.
Women’s life stages and risk factors
Estrogen’s protective effect on women’s heart and brain health fluctuates at different life stages, resulting in unique risk factors.
Reproductive years
Hormonal contraceptives, fertility treatments and pregnancy-related disorders, such as high blood pressure or gestational diabetes, can affect a woman’s risk.
Reproductive years
Hormonal contraceptives, fertility treatments and pregnancy-related disorders, such as high blood pressure or gestational diabetes, can affect a woman’s risk.
Learn more
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Risk factors in this life stage
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Other risk factors for women
Menopause
As women transition to perimenopause and menopause, estrogen production lessens, increasing their risk for heart disease and stroke.
Menopause
As women transition to perimenopause and menopause, estrogen production lessens, increasing their risk for heart disease and stroke.
Learn more
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Risk factors in this life stage
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Other risk factors for women
Postmenopause
After menopause, the protective factors associated with estrogen are gone. This happens along with the natural aging process. Advancing age is also a risk factor.
Postmenopause
After menopause, the protective factors associated with estrogen are gone. This happens along with the natural aging process. Advancing age is also a risk factor.
Learn more
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Risk factors in this life stage
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Other risk factors for women
Sex and gender are complementary concepts, but they are not interchangeable. Sex describes biology, such as hormones and chromosomes, while gender describes people’s lived experience, socially constructed roles, expectations and self-identification. Both impact women’s health including risks for heart and brain health.
- #1
- 89%
- ↗
- cause of premature death of women in Canada is heart disease and stroke
- of women are unaware of their unique risk factors
- High blood pressure markedly increases in severity in women as they age.
Some women experience greater health inequities. Here’s a closer look.
Women’s risk factors
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High blood pressure
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Diabetes, obesity, and high cholesterol
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Modifiable, lifestyle-related risk factors
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Non-modifiable risk factors
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Depression
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Systemic inflammatory and autoimmune disorders
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Polycystic Ovarian Syndrome
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Menstruation and contraception
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Pregnancy related disorders or complications
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Breast cancer treatment
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Chronic kidney disease
Women’s stories
Heart
A high-risk inheritance
Carissa’s diagnosis in pregnancy signaled a bigger issue – one that she’d later take control of, with her family’s support
Stroke
“I am here for a reason.”
Lynne’s Indigenous culture helped sustain her through a devastating stroke
Heart
Saving a mother's heart
It was almost too late when Christina learned that pregnancy complications had increased her risk of heart disease