Cardiovascular disease (CVD) in women: literature overview and medical database mining for reproductive risk factors and CVD in women aged 18 to 50

The goal of this non-comprehensive literature review is to provide a structured high level summary of both the cardiovascular risks and the types of cardiovascular diseases (CVD) specific to women, as well as to raise key questions, such as whether there might be a link between the types of cardiovascular disease encountered in young women and risk factors related to pregnancy complications.
The key findings from the medical database analysis of women aged 18-50 are:
Women with reproductive and pregnancy related conditions have a comparable risk of early cardiovascular disease (CVD) to women with diabetes.
Preeclampsia or preterm labor, even in the absence of diabetes mellitus, are higher risk factors for early CVD than gestational diabetes followed by early diabetes.
In women with a history of preeclampsia but no prior risk factors, about 8.6% had a form of cardiovascular disease while still aged 18-50. Compared to all women aged 18-50, the preeclamptic women with no prior risk factors had a higher rate of all types of hypertension (4.70% essential hypertension), angina, ischemic heart disease and atherosclerosis.
The black and “other” race (mostly Latino) women aged 18-50 seem to be at higher risk of developing hypertension after preeclampsia; the proportion of black women with preeclampsia and subsequent hypertension almost quadruples, at 11% compared to the general proportion of blacks in women 18-50 in this data- base.
A sizable proportion of women aged 18-50 with a history of preeclampsia also had a history of gestational diabetes (at least 22%), preterm labor (at least 19%) or poor fetal growth (at least 14%).
Compared to preeclamptic women with no cardiovascular disease aged 18-50, preeclamptic women with subsequent cardiovascular disease aged 18-50 had significantly higher rates of the following reproductive/pregnancy conditions: ear- lier menopause, PCOS, teenage preeclamptic pregnancy, gestational diabetes, uterine fibroids, preterm labor, poor fetal growth.