Women, men undergoing kidney dialysis face different heart risks

Women have a higher risk of heart failure and stroke than men while undergoing dialysis for kidney failure, a study published in the Journal of the American Heart Association shows.

However, women also have a lower overall risk of dying than men, University of Cincinnati experts found. Their research was recently featured in U.S. News & World Report.

The bottom line:

“Women have to be treated differently when it comes to their heart health,” said Silvi Shah, MD, MS, FASN, FACP, an associate professor in the Division of Nephrology and Hypertension in the Department of Internal Medicine and the study’s principal investigator. 

“The study revealed significant sex differences in cardiovascular health,” said Shah. “These disparities between the sexes and disparities in care point to the need for more personalized heart care for women.”

For the study, researchers tracked the health of more than 508,000 U.S. kidney disease patients who started dialysis between 2005 and 2014.

What did they find?

Women undergoing dialysis had a 14% higher risk of heart-related health problems than men, including a 16% higher risk of heart attack and a 31% higher risk of stroke.

“To the best of our knowledge, it’s the first time these findings of a higher risk of cardiovascular events in women than men among those with kidney failure who are on dialysis have been reported in literature,” said Shah.

Click here to read about the study featured on the UC News site.

Featured image at top: A health care worker with a clipboard checks outputs from a hemodialysis machine. Photo/istock/saengsuriya13.