In 2001, Los Madding was with her husband when she almost lost her life.
"All of the sudden I felt terrible and I told him I had to go sit in the car," Madding said.
She didn't know it at the time, but Madding was suffering a heart attack.
"About 1.2 million people have a heart attack or sudden cardiac death each year," Dr. Brij Bhambi, Central Cardiology, said. "About 60 percent of them are first timers."
Madding didn't know men and women often have different symptoms.
"I didn't have a pain in my heart, but if I had asthma I felt this is what it would be like," Madding said.
"The symptoms can be more subtle, more subtle and different," Bhambi said of heart attacks in women.
While men tend to get crushing chest pain that radiates to the jaw or arm, women may have a subtle sense of not feeling, restlessness, nausea or heartburn.
"You have to have your vigilance very high to catch that process otherwise you run the risk of missing heart attacks," Bhambi said.
Part of that vigilance is a simple screening called a cardiac stress test.
A patient is hooked up to a heart monitor and blood pressure machine, and starts off walking slowly on the treadmill.
The technician gradually pump up the speed and incline to test the heart's ability to respond.
It's something Madding wishes she had done before.
It makes you feel great to know everything is going well," Madding said.
