Vickie Wingfield’s advice about heart health isn’t just significant because she’s been involved in the field for 21 years, or because she’s executive director of the Arkansas Heart Foundation.
It’s because she knows about heart disease firsthand.
“I became the proud owner of a stent in 2009,” she said. “I got the stent on Friday, went back to work on Monday and was on the dance floor the next Friday night.”
The doctor told her she was lucky — if she’d had a heart attack, it’s likely she would have died. Instead, it was a “cardiac incident,” she said.
Wingfield’s passion for educating others about heart disease went into overdrive.
“It’s the No. 1 killer in the world, it’s the No. 1 killer in the United States, it’s the No. 1 killer of Arkansans, and it’s the No. 1 killer of women,” she said.
The kicker, she said, is that 85 percent of heart disease is preventable.
The 62-year-old Maumelle resident knew the warning signs like the back of her hand, but she ignored one.
“I wasn’t exhibiting the classic signs of heart attack. I was 54. I was just fatigued. I thought, ‘Here we go — I’m running too fast, running too hard,’” she said.
Wingfield, who moved to Maumelle about 30 years ago, said she was working in community relations for the Arkansas Heart Hospital in Little Rock at the time, and it was her job to do screenings and events to educate about heart health.
In January 2015, the hospital formed the Arkansas Heart Foundation, a nonprofit organization. She became its executive director.
“When I came into this [field], I never had a thought that I’d be a heart patient,” she said. “They found it by accident.”
The Arkansas Heart Hospital got an upgraded CT scanner, and women in the radiology department asked Wingfield to be their guinea pig to try it. The doctor overseeing the test saw the narrowing of her artery.
She’d been active for years — walking, as well as doing swing, Latin and ballroom dancing — but she had a family history of heart disease. Her father died of a heart attack at age 72, and he had diabetes.
With her family history, she said, extreme fatigue should have been a red flag.
“I always say the No. 1 warning sign of a woman having a heart attack is denial,” she said. “We don’t want it to happen to us because we don’t have time.”
Women’s heart-attack symptoms are different from men’s, too. It’s not always the “elephant-on-the-chest” feeling when women have an episode.
Symptoms include back pain, often between the shoulder blades, jaw pain, extreme fatigue, numbness in the arms and nausea.
“Shortness of breath is a classic warning sign,” she said.
Wingfield said her heart episode gave her a feeling of urgency to educate others.
“I had the terrible, stark reality,” she said. “If I blew [the warning sign] off, knowing everything I know, what are other women doing who don’t have a clue?
“They’ve got to know; they’ve got to know.”
Wingfield said the more risk factors a person has, the greater his or her chances of having a heart attack. Wingfield likes to call it “heart math.”
She had a family history of heart attack and diabetes, plus she had high blood pressure.
Three risk factors increase the risk of women having a heart attack by 12 times, she said.
The major controllable risk factors for heart disease are diabetes, high cholesterol, smoking, being overweight/obese, being sedentary and high blood pressure.
Wingfield said a woman who came to a recent health screening sponsored by the Arkansas Heart Foundation had sky-high blood pressure of 184/110.
“I said, ‘Your risk of a stroke right here today is high,’” Wingfield said.
She asked the woman if she was on high-blood-pressure medication, and the woman said that she was, but that it made her sleepy.
“I said, ‘Go back and get a different one,’” Wingfield said.
“High blood pressure, left untreated, can damage your heart, it can damage your kidneys, it can damage your eyes, and it places you at a high risk for heart attack and stroke,” she said.
Wingfield reiterated that 85 percent of heart attacks are preventable, “but it takes lifestyle changes,” she said.
“There’a always someone who will need medication, but the vast majority can do it through lifestyle and diet. People don’t do it because, ‘I will have to give up my Cheetos, my chips, my ice cream; I will have to stop smoking.’ It is hard work,” she said.
But she pointed out that the payoff is huge — a longer, healthier life.
“The body is an amazing machine,” she said. “The heart’s a muscle that lives in the center of the chest. How you take care of it is how it’s going to take care of you.”
She said the heart is a pump and compared it to a pump in a vehicle. Maintenance is vital to keep it working right.
“Oh, my gosh — that’s what we need to be ringing the bell for, that we can own it — that we can make a change. It’s things that we choose,” she said. “At the end of the day, I own my health; you own your health.”
Wingfield is also a breast-cancer survivor. She found in lump in her breast and was diagnosed with Stage 2 breast cancer in January 2015. She underwent a lumpectomy, six rounds of chemotherapy and four weeks of radiation.
In December 2016, her report was “all good, all clear.”
That brings Wingfield to another point: One in three women die of heart disease; one in 40 women die of breast cancer.
She donates to cancer causes, but Wingfield said she would like to see as much passion poured into saving women from heart disease as from breast cancer.
The focus turns to heart disease in February, which is American Heart Month.
Wingfield is available to speak to organizations all over Arkansas, and she can be contacted by calling (501) 219-7305 or by emailing her at vickie.wingfield@arheart.com. Also, information is available at the Arkansas Heart Foundation website, arkansasheartfoundation.org.
“The two favorite, most-asked for topics are warning signs and risk factors of heart disease, and women and heart disease,” she said.
Wingfield said women need to listen to their bodies because they often give them repeated warning signs before a heart attack.
She said heart disease is high in African-American women. One reason is “there is a ton of hypertension” in that population. She said statistics show that 35 percent of African-American women are aware that heart disease is their No. 1 killer; 39 percent of Latinos are aware; and 65 percent of white women are aware that heart disease is their primary cause of death.
“You can live with one kidney; you can live with one lung. When the heart ceases to beat, you cease to be, so why shouldn’t that be a priority for us every single day?” Wingfield said.
The foundation offers screenings and programs such as a smoking-cessation class and a diabetes boot camp, which is an all-day class led by a certified diabetes educator. Wingfield said two-thirds of diabetics will die of heart disease.
“We’re raising money so we can do more. One-hundred percent of the money we raise, and money that is given, goes back to the community,” she said.
“The biggest goal I have is to make people aware that the Arkansas Heart Foundation exists and to have people come alongside us. Basically, I want them to get on the bandwagon with me. I want them to come along for the ride. We can change this!” she said, her voice rising.
Senior writer Tammy Keith an be reached at (501) 327-0370 or tkeith@arkansasonline.com.