This Friday, young women attending the Go Red for Women Luncheon
are sure to learn that heart disease is not just a man’s disease or something that only affects people over 50.

In fact, heart disease is the number one killer of women ages 20 and older. And not just that, but more women die from heart disease—which includes coronary artery disease, arrhythmias, congenital heart defects, heart attack, and stroke—than the next five causes of death combined, including all forms of cancer. Luckily heart disease is largely preventable.
For Heidi Vancura, 32, of Cedar Rapids, those statistics are close to her heart, literally.

About four of five years ago, Heidi began having what she calls “spells” where she would foam at the mouth and blackout for 20 seconds or so then have to be rushed to the hospital by ambulance. After one such “spell”, she was diagnosed with dilated cardiomyopathy. Heidi has an enlarged heart that doesn’t pump blood properly. Since her diagnosis she’s had surgery to insert a defibrillator, makes regular visits to a cardiologist, and is on medication for the rest of her life. Certainly a list most 20- or 30-somethings don’t have on their to do list.

But Heidi is a lot like most young people her age. “If I didn’t have a heart problem, I wouldn’t think anything of it,” she says. “But there is so much to know about the heart.”

And while she lives with heart
disease every day, Heidi is getting
life back on track. She recently
started playing tennis again (a favorite past time she’d given up for the past few years.) She also hopes
to start a support group of sorts so that she and other young women in the area can get together and talk about how they’ve been affected by heart disease.

This girl’s obviously got heart.
­— KATIE