Olympic swimming champion Libby Trickett suffered a heart attack at just 40 years old — and was sent home by her GP, told it was anxiety. It would take eight months before she learned the truth, a delay she says could have cost her her life. Her story has become a rallying point during Women's Health Week as clinicians, advocates and government officials mount a major push to transform how heart disease is identified and treated in Australian women.
A Diagnosis That Almost Came Too Late
Trickett — a mother of five and accomplished sports commentator — said the experience was something she never could have anticipated. "Never in a million years could I have ever imagined that I would have had a heart attack at the age of 40," she said. After presenting with symptoms, she was dismissed with an anxiety diagnosis and discharged, left without the cardiac care she urgently needed.
The eight-month gap between her heart attack and its correct diagnosis has fuelled her determination to speak out. "If my GP had known the signs of a heart attack in a woman, maybe I wouldn't have been in the position where I went undiagnosed for eight months," Trickett said. She is now calling for far greater awareness — among both medical professionals and the broader public — about how cardiac events present differently in women.
Trickett is not alone. Celebrity chef Mandy Hall described an almost identical experience, saying she too was repeatedly told she was suffering from anxiety before her heart condition was properly identified.
Why Heart Disease in Women Is So Often Missed
The scale of the problem is significant. Around half a million Australian women are currently living with a heart condition, and one woman dies from heart disease every single hour. Despite those figures, women remain 50 per cent more likely to be misdiagnosed than men — a disparity that experts attribute in large part to the different ways the condition manifests in women.
General practitioner Dr Charlotte Hespe explained that women's symptoms frequently diverge from the "classic" presentation most commonly associated with heart attacks. "Women also present quite differently. They may have fatigue, they may have breathlessness, they may just sort of have some pain in their jaw," she said. Those subtler signs are too often attributed to stress, anxiety or other conditions — leaving the underlying cardiac problem undetected and untreated.
The persistent misconception that heart disease is primarily a male condition has long been identified as a barrier to timely diagnosis and appropriate care for women. Heart attacks can strike without warning and with devastating consequences, regardless of age or apparent fitness level — a reality Trickett's experience makes painfully clear.
Government Action and the Call for Systemic Reform
The growing public pressure has now reached the halls of power. Clinicians and leading advocates gathered at Parliament House this week as momentum builds for systemic change. A special ministerial panel has been established to examine cardiovascular disease in women, with a particular focus on why they are so frequently diagnosed late or not at all.
Assistant Health Minister Rebecca White made clear that the status quo is no longer acceptable. "Women are not just little men and the symptoms that we experience when it comes to our cardiovascular health needs to be considered," she said.
The panel is expected to deliver its findings and recommendations before the end of the year. Those recommendations are set to shape the next wave of reforms governing how heart disease in women is recognised, assessed and treated across Australia's health system.
What Comes Next
For Trickett, the hope is that her ordeal — and her willingness to share it publicly — will accelerate the change that is long overdue. With Women's Health Week shining a spotlight on the issue, advocates are urging both patients and clinicians to take women's cardiac symptoms seriously from the moment they arise, and not to default to a diagnosis of anxiety when something more serious may be at play.
