(CBC News) — In Canada, more women than men are dying as a result of a stroke and they’re living with more challenges as they recover, according to a report from the Heart and Stroke Foundation.
The 2018 Stroke Report was released Tuesday and shows women suffer from the effects of stroke “disproportionately” to men, said Charlotte Comrie with Heart and Stroke Foundation of P.E.I.
“If you were to say there were 100 deaths from stroke, women account for almost 60 per cent of them,” she said.
“So it’s an unusual situation where the research has been primarily male and yet … women have a higher percentage of deaths, women have a higher degree of disability and women have poorer outcomes.”
In the past, roughly 66 per cent of all research subjects were men, Comrie said, and it was believed the research would render the same results for women.
“It’s only in the recent past that we’ve learned that that’s not the case,” Comrie said. “And so there’s been a dearth of research on women and we need to change that, without of course lessening the very positive impacts of research on men.” (…)