March of Dimes raises awareness of pregnancy-related heart conditions

NEW YORK (PIX11) -- You may be seeing red everywhere, and that’s because February is America Heart Month. 

This year the focus is on heart health in pregnancy and postpartum. 

“I don’t know that my daughter and I would be here today if it hadn’t been caught early and I hadn’t had the care of my doctors,” Sara Hyde-Lampa, a pre-eclampsia patient, told PIX11 News. Hyde-Lampa had already suffered five miscarriages when, at age 42, she was diagnosed with pre-eclampsia during her pregnancy with her daughter. 

Pre-eclampsia signs include higher blood pressure, swelling, nausea, and vomiting and are often diagnosed through lab work. 

I always knew I had high blood pressure, but then the alarm bells went off and they did an emergency C-section,” Hyde-Lampa told PIX11 News. Her daughter, Elayna was just 4 pounds at birth, five weeks early. 

The baby girl spent 10 days in the neonatal intensive care unit as doctors spent the same amount of time trying to stabilize Sara’s dangerously high blood pressure. 

“Pregnancy is that natural cardiovascular stress that physically puts on the body and tests the system,” said. Elizabeth Cherot, the CEO and president of the March of Dimes. “Think about how you could avoid having a heart attack if you knew about it ten years earlier.”  

On National Women’s Heart Day, the head of the March of Dimes wants to remind all women, particularly those diagnosed with pre-eclampsia during pregnancy, to be on the lookout for signs of cardiovascular disease later in life. 

“Two out of three women who experienced pre-eclampsia will die of cardiovascular disease,” Dr. Cherot said. 

Sarah Hyde-Lampa is just so grateful that her medical team made the pre-eclampsia diagnosis in time to save her life and little Elayna’s. 

“She’s three years old now so full of life and energy,” Hyde-Lampa told PIX11 News. “We couldn’t imagine life without her,” she added. 

Pre-eclampsia is 60 % more common in women of color, according to the president of the March of Dimes, but the reasons are not clear. 

For more information about heart issues in pregnancy and beyond, please go here.