Female Heart Attack Symptoms: What are They?

These chest-related heart attack signs often appear in men, and many women get them, too:
Pressure, fullness or a squeezing pain in the center of the chest, which may spread to the neck, shoulder or jaw;
Chest discomfort with lightheadedness, fainting, sweating, nausea or shortness of breath;
But many women don’t have chest pain. In the Circulation study on early female heart attack symptoms, researchers found that during a heart attack, 43% of the 515 women studied had no “acute chest pain… a ‘hallmark symptom in men,’” according to study authors.
Nevertheless, the study cited evidence that many emergency room doctors still look mainly for chest pain. Only a minority check for the other types of symptoms that women tend to develop. As a result, doctors may miss heart attacks in women.
“Although women can have chest tightness as a symptom of a heart attack, it’s also important for women to recognize that might not be their symptom,” says Nieca Goldberg, MD, a cardiologist and chief of Women’s Cardiac Care at Lenox Hill Hospital in New York City and author of “The Women’s Healthy Heart Program.”
“Women commonly have symptoms of shortness of breath, unexplained fatigue, or pressure in the lower chest, so they easily mistake it as a stomach ailment.”
In the Circulation study, common female heart attack symptoms include:
shortness of breath (57.9%)
weakness (54.8%)
unusual fatigue (42.9%)
Women also had these symptoms:
Nausea
Dizziness
Lower chest discomfort
Upper abdominal pressure or discomfort that may feel like indigestion
Back pain