This year marks the 10th anniversary of Giving Tuesday, a celebration that started as a day to counter the spending of Black Friday and Cyber Monday by donating to charities in need of support and quickly made its way to 70+ countries. In 2021 alone, nonprofits received nearly $3B during a 24-hour period — and this number is expected to go up in 2022.
As a leading organization in women’s heart health, on this Giving Tuesday, we ask that you consider making a donation to WomenHeart to help us further our mission of improving the lives of women with or at risk of heart disease while fighting for equity in heart health.
What we do at WomenHeart
At WomenHeart, we operate with a patient-centered approach. We’re committed to providing support and education to women living with or at risk of heart disease. In practice, this looks like educational programs, peer-led support groups, one-on-one support, and advocacy for policies that advance women’s heart health and support women in their health journey, including those who face increased biases in the healthcare system.
Heart disease is the number one killer of women. Yet sadly, delayed or missed diagnosis is prevalent. Many of our WomenHeart Champions originally dismissed their own symptoms, either because they didn’t want to burden their loved ones or because they didn’t think it was such a big deal. Others have firsthand experience with bias from clinicians, have been denied tests or felt ignored by healthcare providers because they don’t look like the “typical heart patient.” WomenHeart is here to shine a spotlight on those challenges and then to change the narrative.
Once women are diagnosed and able to thrive, they often have the desire to help equip others with the tools they need to prevent and overcome heart disease, so they train to become community educators and support network coordinators at our annual WomenHeart Science & Leadership Symposium.
Our WomenHeart Champions have created a country-wide network that connects women living with heart disease. This network is a source of life-saving information. It’s also a safe space for them to feel heard, supported, and understood by peers who have shared experiences.
Be inspired by our Champions’ stories
Women come to us at their lowest points — having been recently diagnosed with heart disease, often going through traumatic events like heart attacks or surgery. Feeling isolated and anxious, and sometimes, experiencing depression. Our Champions are here and ready to support them.
Women are at the core of what WomenHeart does. Whether it is educating, advocating, or lending a shoulder to lean on, our Champions can tell you about what we do better than we ever could.
For Susan, who survived a heart attack in 2018, becoming a WomenHeart Champion allowed her to speak and write confidently about the risk factors for heart disease in women. She’s since made it a mission to share her story and spread the word to give other women the chance to live a healthier life.
Porothea, a healthcare worker, woke up one day in 2017 unable to walk. The diagnosis: She’d suffered a heart attack — and a stroke. Not having experienced the typical symptoms of what we expect heart attacks to look like, Porothea’s diagnosis was surprising and scary. In her healing journey, she found a community of women who are living with heart disease — the WomenHeart Champions — whom she considers part of a sisterhood. Today, she’s enjoying her grandchildren and continues to manage her heart failure and type 2 diabetes, which is known to increase the risk of developing heart disease.
For Maureen, WomenHeart is a safe haven. She knew of her family’s history of heart disease — her father and uncle died of heart failure —, but she didn’t think it’d affect her due to her healthy lifestyle. Still, a doctor’s visit revealed severe heart failure, which later resulted in a transplant. Desperate to help, her sister discovered WomenHeart. And while it’d take a few months after her diagnosis to engage with us, WomenHeart’s support network became paramount to Maureen’s heart journey.
It’s stories like these that encourage us to wake up every morning and continue to create and share life-saving resources about the number 1 killer of women in the US. Our medical experts have created resources to Prevent, Diagnose, Treat and Thrive with heart disease.
Every dollar you donate allows us to touch the lives of millions of women
Your donation can save and improve the lives of the millions of women in the US living with or at risk of heart disease by educating women to identify the signs and symptoms of heart disease and shining a light on heart health for women.
From the bottom of our hearts, thank you.