Sotiria Limperi, Panagiota Kyriakou, Eftihia Sbarouni, Vasiliki Giannakopoulou, Stella Brili, Aggeliki Gkouziouta, Paraskevi Koutrolou-Sotiropoulou, Anna Antoniou, Anastasia Kitsiou, Areti Komnou, Katerina K. Naka, Constantina Aggeli, Dorothea Tsekoura, Chrysanthi Trikka, Aphrodite Tzifa, Maria Aroni, Alexandra Frogoudaki, Maria Bonou, Maria Papavasiliou, Eva Nyhtari, Lida Pieretta Papavasileiou, Eleni Aggelopoulou, Eleni Hatzinikolaou-Kotsakou, Ourania Papazachou, Aggeliki Mavrogianni, Roy Kourea, Maria Boutsikou, Evaggelia Karvouni, Eftihia Simeonidou, Helena Michalopoulou, Kallirroi Kalantzi, Theodora Zaglavara, Evdokia Petropoulou, Maria E. Marketou, Alexia Stavrati, Eftyhia Demerouti, Eleni Nakou, Sophie Mavrogeni, Maria Riga, Christina Chrysohoou, Amalia Boufidou, Genovefa Kolovou, Artemisia Theopistou, Agathi Rosa Vrettou, Julia Grapsa, Efstathia Prappa, Catherine C Avgeropoulou, Panagiota Kostakou, Aikaterini Fountoulaki, Eftyhia Chamodraka, Panagiota Pietri, Anna Dagre, Maria Nikolaou, Helen Triantafyllidi, Sophia Vaina, Vasiliki Bistola, Eleni Bilianou, and Panagiota Flevari
The perception that women represent a low-risk population for cardiovascular (CV) disease (CVD) needs to be reconsidered. Starting from risk factors, women are more likely to be susceptible to unhealthy behaviors and risk factors that have different impact on CV morbidity and mortality as compared to men. Despite the large body of evidence as regards the effect of lifestyle factors on the CVD onset, the gender-specific effect of traditional and non-traditional risk factors on the prognosis of patients with already established CVD has not been well investigated and understood. Furthermore, CVD in women is often misdiagnosed, underestimated, and undertreated. Women also experience hormonal changes from adolescence till elder life that affect CV physiology. Unfortunately, in most of the clinical trials women are underrepresented, leading to the limited knowledge of CV and systemic impact effects of several treatment modalities on women's health. Thus, in this consensus, a group of female cardiologists from the Hellenic Society of Cardiology presents the special features of CVD in women: the different needs in primary and secondary prevention, as well as therapeutic strategies that may be implemented in daily clinical practice to eliminate underestimation and undertreatment of CVD in the female population.