Multidisciplinary Approach to Cardiovascular Disease in Women
In This Video
- Malissa Wood, MD, is co-director of the Corrigan Women's Heart Health Program at the Massachusetts General Hospital Heart Center and assistant professor of medicine at Harvard Medical School
- In this video, Dr. Wood discusses her team’s comprehensive and multidisciplinary approach to the care of the women with cardiovascular disease risk factors
Malissa Wood, MD, co-director of the Corrigan Women's Heart Health program, has a clinical practice that is primarily devoted to the diagnosis and treatment of heart disease in women. In this video, Dr. Wood discusses her team’s comprehensive and multidisciplinary approach to the care of the women with cardiovascular disease risk factors.
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Transcript
At Mass General Hospital, we’ve developed a comprehensive and multidisciplinary approach to the care of the women with cardiovascular disease risk factors. In particular, we’re really trying to focus on young women who are pregnant, or hoping to become pregnant, to reduce the risk of any cardiovascular complications during pregnancy. We recognize the increasing maternal mortality in the United States, and we’re hoping that our program can help change those numbers.
In addition to our pregnancy and cardiovascular disease service, we also have programs dedicated to managing young women with coronary artery disease. Again, we use a multidisciplinary approach, and work with our colleagues in Radiology, Vascular Imaging, Cardiac Catheterization Lab, and even Cardiac Surgery when necessary to develop better care for these young women with previously very difficult to manage types of cardiovascular disease.
The most exciting thing on the horizon for me in my field of work is improving care for young women with cardiovascular disease. We manage a very complex group of patients, and we’re able to do this in a novel fashion using the multidisciplinary approach. We’re also very interested in linking the stressors that women face on a daily basis to their risk for cardiovascular disease, and we want to manage their stress better so that we can reduce that increased risk that they face.