Breakthrough made in heart disease study

Researchers at Sydney’s Royal Prince Alfred hospital and the Heart Research Institute say they have discovered a major reason why men are more likely to die from coronary heart disease than women.

Researchers at Sydney’s Royal Prince Alfred hospital and the Heart Research Institute say they have discovered a major reason why men are more likely to die from coronary heart disease than women.A two-and-a-half year study has found that male sex hormones or androgens activate the genes which stimulate heart disease in men but do not affect the same genes in women.Cardiologist Dr Martin Ng, says it is a breakthrough finding which in the long term may lead to gender specific treatments for coronary heart disease.”Male sex hormones stimulate genes that promote coronary artery disease in men but in a very surprising finding, when we used the same male sex hormones in women, we found that nothing happened, even though both men and women have males sex hormones,” Dr Ng said.”It’s just that men have more and women have less.”RPA cardiologist and director of research Professor David Celermajer says men have earlier and more severe heart disease than women.”The incidence of coronary deaths in men aged 35 to 65 is up to 500 per cent more than women of the same age group,” he said.”This gender difference in heart disease is the principle reason why women live considerably longer than men in most, if not all populations.”The study has been published in the October edition of the Journal of the American College of Cardiology.Heart disease is the most common cause of death among Australians.Previous studies have looked at the potential cardioprotective effects of oestrogens in women, however recent clinical trials have shown an increased number of heart attacks in women taking hormonal replacement therapies.(Source: ABC, Tuesday, September 16, 2003. 12:45pm (AEST))