Why Black women are at higher risk of heart disease — and what we can do about it

Stacey Rosen, MD, joins Sandra Lindsay on this 20-Minute Health Talk to discuss why heart disease disproportionately impacts Black women, what factors contribute to their risk and what health systems like Northwell are doing to change the statistics.

Meet the expert

Stacey Rosen is the senior vice president of Katz Institute for Women's Health at Northwell Health; partners council professor of women's health at the Donald and Barbara Zucker School of Medicine at Hofstra/Northwell; and a spokeswoman for the American Heart Association.

Sandra Lindsay, DHSc, MBA, MSN, RN, is Northwell’s ambassador to raise health locally, nationally and globally. She leads the health system in expanding knowledge of issues that affect community health, public policy and other aspects of health care. She spent spent 29 years in nursing, most recently serving as director of critical care nursing at a Long Island Jewish Medical Center in New Hyde Park. On December 14, 2020, Sandra volunteered to become the first American vaccinated with the Pfizer and BioNTech Covid-19 vaccine.

Podcast transcript

Chapters

• 00:01 - Intro
• 00:39 - Why sex, gender and background matters
• 02:49 - Risk factors in Black women
• 05:06 - What can you do?
• 06:26 - Making research more accessible
• 07:47 - The social determinants of health
• 09:30 - Prioritizing yourself
• 11:52 - Recognizing symptoms
• 14:10 - Where should women get their health information?
• 16:09 - What are health system's doing? 
• 17:57 - Finding your healthcare partner
• 20:33 - A roadmap for heart-healthy living