Directed by the Act Act for the hearts of women in partnership with OpinionWay, the first barometer of women’s health reveals that a quarter of French women consider their health bad or very bad. Of the 2054 women questioned, more than a third say they have already experienced a lack of listening or minimization of their symptoms during medical consultations. This proportion even reaches 60% in under 25.
The survey highlights a major gap in the medical care of women. Although cardiovascular pathologies represent their first cause of mortality, one in two women never approached the subject with a health professional. This ignorance of cardio-gynecology perfectly illustrates the failures of the French care system.
In addition, French women adopt attitudes that affect their own health. Accustomed to favoring the well-being of their relatives, 74% of them use self-medication before consulting a doctor. Medical meetings often go to the background: a third of the women interviewed admit that they have already canceled or postponed a consultation, mainly for family reasons or because they no longer deemed this necessary.
This negligence is all the more worrying since 80% of cardiovascular diseases could be avoided thanks to simple preventive gestures. However, received ideas persist: 41% of respondents wrongly believe that two hours of weekly sport are enough to rule out the risks. Added to this is a lack of chronic sleep (a quarter of French women sleep less than six hours per night), insufficient physical activity and underused post-menopause hormonal treatments. This cocktail of factors considerably weakens their health.
Faced with this observation, the Act for the Heart of Women’s hearts refuses that female health remains a secondary issue. Its co-founders, Professor Claire Mounier-Véhier and Thierry Drilhon, plead for general mobilization. “The prevention and the care of his health does not consist in consulting only in the event of illness. This is neither a cost nor of lost time, but a real investment. We must all assume our responsibility to abandon the curative model and turn to prevention,” said Thierry Drilhon in a press release.
There is no shortage of action levers. We must train health professionals in cardio-gynecology, develop targeted information campaigns, offer free screening programs and involve companies in the health of their employees. The objective remains clear: French women must be better listened to, better informed and better accompanied in their care path. Because dying simply because we are a woman remains an unacceptable reality.