Saving lives, one handbag at a time

Saint Luke’s cardiologist Tracy Stevens, M.D., is sharing her considerable clinical expertise in a national heart health awareness campaign that launched on May 7. The campaign features actress/singer/author Vanessa Williams, who lost two grandmothers to heart attacks at young ages.

The campaign, Handbags & Hearts, leverages the link between women and their handbags – the one item they do not leave home without – and urges women to take the Handbags & Hearts pledge to carry aspirin at all times to be prepared for a sudden heart attack. Being prepared by carrying aspirin, knowing the symptoms of heart attack and not putting off calling 911 if a heart attack is suspected, can be the difference between life and death. Handbags & Hearts is a partnership with Bayer HealthCare, the makers of Bayer® Aspirin, WomenHeart: The National Coalition for Women with Heart Disease, and Williams.

Dr. Stevens is medical director of the Saint Luke’s Muriel I. Kauffman Women’s Heart Center and member of WomenHeart’s national Scientific Advisory Council, WomenHeart’s advisory group of the nation’s leading experts on women’s heart health. Dr. Stevens participated in a national media tour for the Handbags & Hearts kick-off this week.

Take the pledge
For every pledge to make over a handbag by adding potentially life-saving aspirin made on HandbagsAndHearts.com, Bayer HealthCare will make donations to WomenHeart to support its mission to serve the 42 million American women living with or at risk for heart disease. To learn more about Handbags & Hearts and to take the pledge, visit HandbagsAndHearts.com.