The 18th annual Red, Set Go! Heart Luncheon netted a record-breaking $266,000 to benefit the Olympic Medical Center Heart Center in Sequim.

The Friday, Feb. 28 luncheon, produced by the OMC Foundation and presented by Virginia Mason Franciscan Health, also drew the most participants in its history, with 390 people attending.

A major donor to the event was George Brown, a longtime OMC donor who contributed $100,000 to the cause of upgrading cardiovascular ultrasound equipment.

Over the past decade, the heart luncheon has raised $850,000 specifically for the heart center, event chair Karen Rogers said.

The luncheon’s purpose is two-fold: to raise funds for the heart center and to provide heart health education, especially for women whose symptoms often are more subtle than those of men.

Despite the difficulty in pinning down symptoms, women’s risk of dying from heart disease is no less than that of men, according to Dr. Kara Urnes, medical director of the OMC Heart Center.

Heart disease is the leading cause of death for both men and women, said Urnes and keynote speaker Dr. Sarah Clark.

The risk of dying of heart disease is 10 times greater than dying of breast cancer for women, said Clark, a cardiothoracic surgeon at Virginia Mason Medical Center in Seattle

Women tend to present with cardiac disease later in life than men and are more likely to have an emergency presentation because of a variety of factors that signal a breakdown in the medical system or communication, Clark said.

So it’s important that women know their risk factors, control their diabetes or high blood pressure, see their primary doctor and cardiologist and advocate for themselves, she said.

Exercise is key, she said, advocating for 150 minutes per week of any kind of movement — walking, raking leaves, anything that gets the heart rate up.

“Exercise is the best method we have for reducing heart disease,” Clark said.

Clark and others emphasized that women must pay attention to their bodies and seek help even if the symptom that concerns them is unusual.

“If something doesn’t feel right, keep advocating for yourself,” said Terri Harmon, who told how close she came to dying.

Harmon, who lives in Port Angeles, would never have suspected that a deep pain in the core of her body would signal a heart attack.

But that’s exactly what it was.

Harmon felt the odd sensation as she shopped at Costco on Aug. 17 last year. The strange gnawing pain in her abdomen wrapped around her back. She considered calling her husband, Jack Harmon, but instead drove herself home, where she fell asleep.

When she awakened, the pain was still there. Her husband insisted on taking her to the emergency room at Olympic Medical Center, where she was told she had had a heart attack and had a blockage in a cardiac artery.

“Are you kidding me?” was the clean version of her immediate response, Harmon, 66, told the audience.

“The only thing I could think was that I don’t have time for this.”

Harmon said she would never forget the look on her husband’s face or how she felt “to hear my son tearfully tell me he wasn’t ready to lose me.”

She was transferred to St. Joseph Medical Center in Tacoma, where she was told an artery on the right back side of the heart was 99 percent blocked.

On Aug. 19, a stent was inserted. She was told that her heart had suffered no damage from the heart attack her doctor told her “was 40 years in the making.”

She had never had a diagnosis of heart disease and had begun a year earlier to conscientiously invest in her health.

“Invest in your heart now,” Harmon said at the luncheon.

Now, she is doing well, she has said, crediting OMC’s cardiac rehabilitation program.

“Up until then, I was terrified of just living. After that cardiac program, I flourished,” she said.

She constantly emphasizes the importance of women paying attention.

“My advice is if there is any question in your mind, there is no shame in going in and getting checked,” Harmon said before the luncheon. “For years I would go to my primary care doctor about pains in the chest and being short of breath, and he said it’s just stress.”

For more information about OMC’s cardiac services, see olympicmedical.org/services/cardiology. For more about the OMC Foundation, see omhf.org or phone 360-417-7144 or go to 1015 Georgiana St., Port Angeles.

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Leah Leach is a former executive editor for Peninsula Daily News.