Three Freaking Days!
When it comes to health, my experience has shown that women tend to take a little better care of their health than men do. I checked back to when I began to use the phrases, “Never, never, ever, ignore chest pain” and “When in doubt, check it out!” It was about 20 years ago. And yet I’m still surprised when people don’t do it.
In fact, it happened within the past two weeks. A reader called me about some health issues. She wasn’t a stranger; we had talked before about her issues. This time it was an inquiry about discomfort in the chest and back—not really pain, but not nothing either. Doing some yoga and deep breathing seemed to help. I always tell people that the safest, most conservative approach is to go check it out at the emergency room. That’s the only way you know for sure. We left it at that.
Finally, a couple of days later, the discomfort got worse and moved toward her left arm. She finally went to the ER—three freaking days after the symptoms began. At least she didn’t wait ten days like my friend Jim.
I understand the hesitation; I’ve faced it myself. No one wants to seem alarmist or silly, and not everyone has health insurance to cover the costs. Still it’s better to be alive with a hospital bill than with a damaged heart or worse for delaying.
The Bottom Line
Let me be very clear about this: when it comes to your heart or your head, when in doubt, check it out. Delaying may make things worse.
Or the problem may turn out to be nothing. You thought we were done with this person? Nope, but I’ll save it for next week.
Women’s hearts are different and the symptoms related to heart disease may be different. This may be a great time to pick up Dr. Chet’s Health Tips for Women with Dr. Pam. As an incentive, I’m lowering the price on the MP3s to $4.95 for Health Tips for Men and Health Tips for Women through the Fourth of July.
What are you prepared to do today?
