Silent Diseases Every Woman Should Know: Spot Early Symptoms and Protect Your Health
Conditions like fatty liver, sarcopenia and osteoporosis can be easy to miss in the early stages
When we break a bone, the damage is obvious. But not every health condition in life is so clear-cut. Many ailments are considered a “silent disease” because they don’t have obvious symptoms. Instead, these issues can brew below the surface until they wreak havoc on our quality of life.
“There are several silent health conditions that can sneak up on us pretty much at any time in our lives, but increasingly so as we age,” reveals osteopathic physician Anna Cabeca, DO, triple-board certified in ob/gyn, integrative medicine and anti-aging/regenerative medicine.
She explains why it is so important for women to act now to stave off silent health threats: “The hormonal change we undergo in our life cycles, especially as we get to menopause, have a major impact on our body’s ability to surmount, resist or fight back.” Here, the silent diseases you should have on your radar and how to protect yourself.
Woman's World Answers
8 silent diseases every woman should watch for
Talk to your doctor if you notice symptoms of any of these silent diseases.
1. Heart disease
“Often thought of as a ‘man’s disease,’ heart disease is the leading cause of death for women in the United States,” says Dr. Cabeca, who’s also the bestselling author of The Hormone Fix. “It’s crucial for women to understand their risk factors, which include high blood pressure, high cholesterol, smoking, diabetes and family history.”
What to look for: Chest pain, shortness of breath or fatigue. These could be early signs of future heart problems, heart attack or heart failure.
What to do: Get routine blood pressure screenings. Aim for healthy blood pressure readings of less than 120/80 mm Hg.
2. Sleep apnea
Some 22 million Americans suffer from sleep apnea, where breathing is temporarily paused or disrupted during sleep, says Dr. Cabeca. But people often associate it with only overweight patients. That’s not always the case, making this condition easy to miss in other folks who have naturally narrow airways or other structural issues that affect breathing. In fact, a University of Pennsylvania Health System study found that having more fat located in the tongue put people at risk for sleep apnea. And it’s important to act early, since sleep apnea increases the risk of heart disease, stroke and diabetes.
What to look for: Snoring, unexplained daytime fatigue or complaints from your partner about disrupted sleep.
What to do: A sleep study can help diagnose the condition. Treatment options for sleep apnea include wearing a continuous positive airway pressure (CPAP) mask and an oral appliance. Losing weight can also improve bedtime breathing.
3. Osteoporosis
We’ve all heard that this condition weakens bones and increases the risk of fractures, especially in postmenopausal women. But bone loss begins as early as age 35. “The tricky thing with bone and muscle loss is they sneak up on you, just a few percentage points of loss a year, but it’s a bad kind of compound interest,” says Yale-educated physician Eric J. Rosenbaum, MD, who specializes in anti-aging medicine. You often don’t know or feel the change, but he explains, “There’s a tipping point where—boom—you have a minor fall and your hip breaks because of weakened bones.” That’s why early detection and prevention are crucial.
What to look for: Reduced movement, increased weakness or recent weight loss (we often lose bone or muscle tissue before fat).
What to do: “A bone mineral density test is key, but one I really like to follow is C-Telopeptide, or CTX,” says Dr. Rosenbaum. “It is an earlier indication of metabolic bone loss than a density study.” A diet rich in calcium and vitamin D helps, too.
4. Sarcopenia
Like the loss of bone, the loss of muscle mass, a silent disease called sarcopenia, can hugely impact our health and longevity. “Both bones and muscles are ‘use it or lose it systems,’” says Dr. Rosenbaum. “All of a sudden, it seems, sarcopenia crosses a threshold and you can no longer get up out of your favorite chair. It seems to suddenly occur, but it is typically decades in the making.”
What to look for: Weakness and loss of activity. Taking a GLP-1 medication like Ozempic can also deplete muscle stores.
What to do: Exercise helps bones and muscles work together to stay active and strong. “Good stress for bones and muscles can be things such as walking, standing and weight bearing exercise,” Dr. Rosenbaum says. “To maintain bone and muscle, you also need to feed them both what they crave—proteins and minerals like calcium and vitamins like D.”
5. Silent stroke
This type of stroke may go unnoticed due to subtle or no classic symptoms like loss of speech, balance problems or facial drooping. However, it can still cause brain damage and increase the risk of future blood vessel damage and strokes, says Dr. Cabeca. “The decrease of [protective] estrogen levels during menopause will make us more susceptible to artery blockages and develop higher cholesterol levels, which, in turn, can increase the risk of heart diseases, stroke or any cardiovascular complication,” Dr. Cabeca notes.
What to look for: Changes in vision, speech or balance. Being postmenopausal also increases stroke risk.
What to do: Have routine physicals that include tracking your cholesterol levels. Studies suggest a total cholesterol level of about 150 mg/dL—with LDL below 100 mg/dL—is optimal for stroke prevention. Having high levels of “bad” LDL cholesterol may increase your stroke risk.
6. Autoimmune conditions
Autoimmune diseases occur when our immune system gets confused and begins to attack its own healthy tissues. This can cause rheumatoid arthritis, lupus and Hashimoto’s thyroiditis. And of the estimated 50 million autoimmune cases in the US, most affect women, with many of those remaining undiagnosed because the symptoms seem so mysterious to pin down. Recent breakthrough research in Circulation shows that trauma may be linked to autoimmune conditions, too.
What to look for: Symptoms can vary widely, but may include pain, fatigue and brain fog. Ask your doctor about preliminary tests such as the Antinuclear Antibody (ANA) test and the C-Reactive Protein (CRP) test.
What to do: Consider an anti-inflammatory diet. Sara Gottfried, MD, educated at MIT and Harvard and author of The Autoimmune Cure, finds people often see improvement when they cut out inflammatory foods like sugar and wheat from their diets. She explains, “When you look at the randomized, double blind studies performed in people with rheumatoid arthritis, 30 to 40 percent of patients improve substantially by using an elimination diet to identify foods that precipitate symptoms.”
7. Cervical and ovarian cancers
“While these cancers can affect women of all ages, the risk increases as we get older,” says Dr. Cabeca of this type of silent disease. Yet many women stop getting routine pelvic exams after their childbearing years.
What to look for: Unexplained vaginal bleeding, pelvic pain and bloating.
What to do: “It’s important for women to be aware of the risk factors [like family history] and to get regular screenings,” Dr. Cabeca says. “In other words, regardless of age, get a Pap smear and pelvic exam at least every one to two years.” You might also consider Cancer Check Labs, a blood test that looks for CTC (circulating tumor cells) in the body to catch around 200 different types of cancer at stage zero, or before symptoms kick in.
8. Fatty liver disease
The liver is responsible for filtering sugar, fat, alcohol, medications, hormones and environmental toxins in the body. Sadly, ultra-processed foods are overtaxing the liver, resulting in an epidemic of a condition called non-alcoholic fatty liver disease. At first, the organ just gets clogged. But if left untreated, the condition can lead to liver cirrhosis and failure. An estimated 80 percent of women over 40 have an underperforming liver, according to Amy Shah, MD, the Harvard-trained internist and author of I’m So Effing Hungry,
What to look for: There are no known symptoms for fatty liver. But fatigue and mysterious weight gain can be signs that your body’s detoxing organ has become sluggish.
What to do: Ask your doctor to monitor your liver health. Dr. Shah adds liver-detoxing foods can improve the organ’s function. One thing that can help: Eating vegetables that contain sulfur compounds called glucosinolates, present in foods like broccoli, turnips and kale.
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