One afternoon in October 2024, 39-year-old Michelle Roberts felt the usual wave of post-lunch exhaustion that comes with looking after her five young children.
But there was another problem, too. A bout of particularly severe heartburn that left her feeling nauseous.
She called her husband Ben, 43, an IT manager, who was on his way home from work, to tell him she was feeling unwell and needed to lie down.
Alarmed at how ill she sounded, Ben urged Michelle to call the emergency services.
‘She was hesitant because she didn’t want to bother them,’ says Ben. ‘Now I wish we had.’
By the time Ben got home, Michelle was in bed and had called a medical helpline for advice. After speaking with her, the operator decided to send an ambulance.
Ben was instructed to wait downstairs for the paramedics, so he decided to make dinner for the children at the same time.
‘Neither of us knew how serious the situation was,’ he says.
When Michelle felt a burning sensation in her throat and a wave of fatigue, she initially she thought she was suffering from food poisoning
But within hours she was slumped over, unconscious and barely breathing
‘As I was walking out the door she said: “Ben, I’m scared.”
‘I assured her she would be fine because an ambulance was coming. That was the last thing she said to me.’
When Ben went back upstairs half an hour later to check on her, with no ambulance in sight, he found her slumped over and not breathing.
He immediately began CPR while frantically calling emergency services to find out when the ambulance would arrive.
Ben continued performing CPR for more than an hour, as blood began to pour from Michelle’s eyes, ears and mouth and her ribs broke under the pressure.
An hour and 20 minutes after the initial call, an ambulance finally arrived – but it was too late. Michelle was dead. Doctors later told Ben she had suffered a fatal heart attack.
‘My children and I were downstairs in the living room,’ says Ben.
‘A paramedic came down and said there had been a catastrophic event and I just knew.’
The mother-of-five had no pre-existing health concerns and led a fairly active lifestyle
‘I was in shock, but I took my children one by one upstairs to say goodbye to their mom. The kids were everything to her and in an instant our lives had been changed forever.’
When Michelle went to bed early with what felt like acid reflux, there was no indication that she was minutes away from suffering a deadly heart attack.
The healthy mother of five had none of the ‘classic’ symptoms. There was no crushing chest pain or shortness of breath.
The only clues that something was seriously wrong were symptoms millions of women experience and brush off every day: fatigue, nausea and heartburn.
Cardiologists speaking to the Daily Mail say her death highlights a dangerous reality: women at risk of one of the most serious types of heart attack are too often dismissed because their symptoms are atypical.
Michelle suffered a major heart attack caused by a complete blockage in one of the main arteries supplying blood to her heart – a type aptly dubbed a ‘widowmaker’ because of its grim survival rates.
Only 12 percent of people who suffer this type of heart attack outside a hospital survive, a fate thousands of Americans could face if they don’t know the risk factors and warning signs.
Experts say the tragedy also highlights the importance of knowing key risk factors such as cholesterol levels, blood pressure and family history, as well as recognizing less typical symptoms including persistent fatigue, shortness of breath, heartburn and a general feeling that something isn’t right.
Michelle had none of the classic warning signs of a heart attack – other than a sense that something was seriously wrong
‘Dismissing these as panic, indigestion or menopause is a recognized pattern,’ says Dr Oliver Guttman, a cardiologist at St Bartholomew’s Hospital in London.
‘But any combination of these symptoms, especially in someone with cardiac risk factors, should be treated as a red flag for urgent treatment.’
So, how can you know if you’re at risk of a widowmaker heart attack? And what should you do if you begin to show symptoms?
First, it’s important to understand why heart attacks happen.
A heart attack occurs when blood flow to the heart muscle suddenly becomes blocked. Around 370,000 Americans die from coronary heart disease every year, while hundreds of thousands suffer heart attacks.
Smoking, heavy drinking, a poor diet high in salt and fat, obesity and a lack of exercise can all increase the risk.
But two of the most important indicators are blood pressure and cholesterol levels.
Nearly half of US adults have high blood pressure, which occurs when the force of blood pushing against artery walls is consistently too high.
Call handlers sent an ambulance – which Ben eagerly awaited whilst cooking for their five kids. By the time it arrived, Michelle was dead
High cholesterol can also cause fatty deposits to build up inside the arteries, increasing the risk of a potentially deadly blockage.
Yet millions of Americans are unaware they have either condition.
Michelle, however, appeared to have neither. Ben says she had her blood pressure and cholesterol checked in the year before her death and both were healthy.
However, experts warn that normal results do not mean someone is immune from a heart attack. Other factors, including age, family history and genetics, can also influence a person’s risk.
And when a heart attack does strike, recognizing the warning signs and seeking treatment quickly can be the difference between life and death.
Studies suggest that for every 30 minutes a heart attack patient delays getting to the hospital, their life expectancy may be reduced by roughly one year.
How quickly someone seeks help often depends on whether they recognize the warning signs.
A 2020 Spanish study found that only five percent of patients with a good knowledge of heart attack symptoms waited more than an hour to seek help, compared with around a fifth of those with poor knowledge.
This can be particularly important for women, whose heart attacks are more likely to be missed because their symptoms can differ from those traditionally associated with the condition.
The classic warning signs include chest pain or heaviness and pain that radiates down the left arm or into the jaw, neck or back. Nausea, vomiting and fatigue can also occur.
But, according to Dr Guttman, women may instead experience less obvious symptoms such as a lack of energy, heartburn and indigestion. Patients and doctors can dismiss these as less serious problems such as stress, with potentially deadly consequences.
‘The problem is, women don’t present in the typical way we might expect,’ says Dr Guttman.
‘If you look at heart attack awareness posters, you often see a picture of an overweight man in his forties complaining of heaviness in his chest and clutching his left arm.
‘But not only are women less likely to complain, they also describe more atypical symptoms such as fatigue, heartburn and shortness of breath rather than crushing chest pain.’
Ben believes emergency responders should have reacted more quickly to Michelle’s call for help, given her symptoms.
He has now filed a claim against the NHS over the delay. Health officials say Michelle’s call came at an unusually busy time for the ambulance service.
Ben has now been forced to leave his $120k a year job to look after his children while suffering from PTSD. His message: Know the symptoms
‘I’m now a single father with five children surviving on government assistance, when there was a chance it could have been a different story,’ he says.
‘Simply saying the emergency service was under a lot of pressure that day and we’re sorry is not good enough,’ he said.
Above all, Ben wants to raise awareness of the signs and symptoms of a potential heart attack in women and reduce the number of people dying each year.
‘Our lives have changed drastically and will never be the same,’ he says.
‘My main message is that everyone should learn the symptoms of a heart attack in women, and get basic first aid training, so other families do not have to endure the pain and loss we continue to experience.’
A spokesperson for the East of England Ambulance Service said: ‘Our thoughts remain with Mr Roberts and his family following the death of his wife, Michelle, in October 2024.
‘We recognize that our response on that day fell below the standards patients and their families have a right to expect, and we have apologized to Mr Roberts for this.
‘Following a full review by our patient safety team, we have carefully considered the circumstances surrounding this incident and the lessons that can be learned. At the time of the emergency call, the ambulance service was facing significant operational pressures, including delays in transferring patients at local hospitals.
‘However, we recognize the impact that our delayed response had on Mr Roberts and his family.’
The Bedfordshire Hospitals NHS Trust and NHS Patient Safety team have been approached for comment.