Women and cardiovascular disease: contributions from the Framingham Heart Study.

The Framingham Heart Study is one of the leading longitudinal cohort studies of cardiovascular disease in both men and women. Women have been included since study inception in 1948. The Study has provided a wealth of sex-specific information concerning coronary and cardiovascular disease incidence as well as the impact of multiple risk factors on disease occurrence. Risk factor prediction charts based on Framingham data can be used by physicians to determine an individual patient's probability of developing CHD or stroke. Investigations of factors unique to women, such as menopause and estrogen replacement, and factors of interest to women, such as weight cycling and smoking cessation, have been reported.