“Grey’s Anatomy” actress Chandra Wilson recently won the Excellence in Media Wegner Award from WomenHeart: The National Coalition for Women with Heart Disease for her moving and thought-provoking portrayal of a heart attack on the show. Photo courtesy of WomenHeart

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Chandra Wilson spends her days acting as formidable Dr. Miranda Bailey on the hit ABC medical drama “Grey’s Anatomy” and recently made waves for her moving and thought-provoking performance during her portrayal of her character’s heart attack.

In the episode, titled “Don’t Fear the Reaper,” Dr. Bailey checks herself into an ER at a different hospital and attempts to convince its doubtful male doctor she’s having a heart attack. The scene quickly showcases how frustrating it can be for women (particularly women of color) to be misdiagnosed or diagnosed based on their “emotions,” rather than their symptoms. It also shows how differently women experience heart attacks in comparison to men.

Wilson has her own history with medical advocacy, since her daughter suffers from the rare condition, cyclic vomiting syndrome (CVS) — a condition she had to even fight to find a name for. In 2012, she directed an episode of “Grey’s” that showcased CVS to help other families identify it.

The response to the heart attack storyline has been well received, and Wilson was recently awarded the Excellence in Media Award from WomenHeart: The National Coalition for Women with Heart Disease.

“We’re thrilled to give Chandra Wilson the Excellence in Media Award for her incredibly accurate and moving performance,” explained WomenHeart CEO Mary McGowan. “Her character’s persistence and self-advocacy will live on in the millions of viewers who are now more educated and informed about how to advocate for their heart health.”

Recently, Wilson talked with the Beacon. highlighting her experience with the advocacy, thoughts on acting and plans for the future.

Q: How did the storyline of your character’s heart attack come about? Was it something you or the writing team had always been thinking about?

A: The idea was brought to me by the writer Elizabeth Finch. She came to me during filming one day and said, “So I have this idea.” She basically went down the entire episode. Everything she wanted to know. I was so excited because she was so excited. She made it amazing.

The opportunity to have to highlight advocacy in particular, to highlight the difference for women, especially women of color, was something we really embraced and to put out there in the world.

To have someone like Miranda Bailey to tell that story — someone that everybody thinks they know — it’s like the story is coming from someone’s friend. With all of those components as an actor and as a women — to get that word out so people can take that away from it any message that they needed to take.

Q: What were some of the things you tried to portray in the scene, since symptoms of a heart attack present very differently in women than in men?

A: What was really important was the fact that Miranda knew her own body. And that she knew that something was wrong. I also think it was really important that she portray someone who didn’t want to let anyone else know about it because that’s one of the other big things we do as women. We try to go through things alone. And she did all of that.

She didn’t want to tell anybody. She was taking her antacids, you know, thinking that was good enough, but at the same time, she knew that she better take herself to an emergency room somewhere.

The other thing was to get the statistics out, even though I was speaking to people that should know — the other physicians. Bailey’s always teaching, so that wasn’t out of character for her to do so. And then ultimately to have a cardiac incident right there in the emergency room, and to not only be there and say she’s right, and that thank goodness she’s still in the emergency room and get treated with immediacy.

Q: Was it difficult shooting that scene? As a women, I can identify with the frustrations of having your worries being dismissed as “emotional” or “psychological.”

A: The entire episode was just invigorating to me. It was exciting to me. As an actor, I was awakened by that challenge, and then I was also in the know how important it was to be as authentic and as informative as I could be, because this was going to help somebody. Somebody was either going to see themselves or they were going to see a friend or they were going to see a family member and take away the stigma of not only heart disease but of advocacy — of taking care of yourself.

Q: I’m a little familiar with your daughter’s condition CVS. Did shooting that heart attack scene bring back any flashbacks to getting your daughter treated in the ER? Either being dismissed or frustrated?

A: Right. The thing that Elizabeth Finch and I would always talk about is our similarity in advocacy, in having to fight for yourself and having to tell your story over and over again to every ear that comes in, as if you were telling your story for the first time.

You have to have patience in that part of the journey. And even with Miranda Bailey being chief of surgery, she still isn’t allowed to know more than the physician she’s speaking to, because once she knows more, then she can be taking care of herself, as far as the physician is concerned.

You have to get this other human being to want to fight for you just as hard as you’re fighting for yourself. And those are the things I could related to, as far as sort’ve an etiquette — an ER etiquette — that you have to learn in order to get the help that you need.

Q: You also directed a previous episode. How did it feel to advocate for your daughter’s condition on the show?

A: To be able to get the word cyclic vomiting syndrome out into a primetime audience of “Grey’s Anatomy” watchers was — that was the most incredible thing because as anyone going through chronic illness or something that’s taken a while to get diagnosed, when you finally get the name of what it is that you’re going through, that takes so much weight off you because up until that point, you just think you’re crazy.

Like nobody understands, nobody’s getting it, nobody can figure it out, and so when you get that name, that starts you on that journey to health. So me being able, the show embracing the fact that I wanted to tell this story and given the honor of directing it and being able to put that out into the mainstream, the response that I’ve got back, mostly from the community, is “Oh my God! That is something, or that’s what I’m going through, or that’s what my kid has, and it has a name.”

That was my goal, and people still talk to me about this to this day. They’ll send an email, send in letters, or say something on social media about, because everybody’s watching on Netflix, we know we’re in the loop now of binge watching, and so it gives the show up over and over again to the next generation — oh my God — of watchers, it gets to put a name to something that they’re going through.

Q: Have you directed many episodes Grey’s?

A: This season, season 14, I’ve directed my 18^th episode of “Grey’s Anatomy.” I started in season six, and I usually direct two episodes a season.

Q: Was directing always something you were interested in?

A: Not in the least! I saw myself as the director maybe in theater, since that’s my home. I never thought in television. It was my producers who told me that I should really think about directing. I don’t know what they’re motivation is, I don’t know what they saw, and I didn’t bother asking why, I just said “okay,” and then figured out how to rise to the task that they put in my lap.

Q: What’s that experience like for you, in contrast with acting?

It’s like working a different muscle. It’s much more analytical. The anal retentive side of me loves it. For television, it’s collecting the puzzle pieces that end up being the episode.

I of course give my say in my directing cut, but it’s about the producers in television and ultimately what they want and what they would like their audience to feel. It’s my job to give them the material they need, in order to make sure they have a cohesive show. And that has been a very satisfying journey for me.

Q: Over the years, you’ve really become a healthcare advocate. Is there any particular health issue that you’d like the show cover next?

A: Wow! There are so many. There are so many. I love the fact that we touch on some part of somebody’s life every week, or that some people have something to point to and say, ‘that’s me.’

We oftentimes will bring up medical stories, but because its dramatic series television, it more often has to do with the relationship that gets created between either the patient and the doctor, or the doctors, and then the name of this ailment that gets the chance to be out there.

We have given the platform to so many different things, and let me tell you, it’s never anything that we make up! Everything comes from — what’s that expression about life is stranger than fiction? That’s true. Like that worm episode we did [an infamous episode where worms were growing in a patient’s body]. It’s things that have actually happened, so I just think that we should keep doing what we’re doing, and I’m living in the gravy of it. I already got the thing out there that I wanted to talk about.

I guess what’s exciting about heart disease to me is that this isn’t done. This now is a part of her life. And what we’ll get to see through the seasons now is how she lives with heart disease, what does and what doesn’t work. Like, what is failing? What is not going well? That’s really important to get out there to the audience.

Q: How does it feel to get this award from WomenHeart?

A: Wow, I am incredible honored because we’re passionate, all of us involved. The writer giving this story to me, to passing off the story to our director Nicole Rubio, who is another one of my champions. She was the script supervisor on “Grey’s Anatomy” since the beginning, since season one, and she’s now been promoted to full-time director, and you can’t hide her anymore; she’s always working. So the fact that she was able to take care of me this episode was amazing.

It was a beautiful gift to be able to do it, and the fact that so many responded in the way that we had envisioned they’d respond means that we did a good job, and that’s what we were most concerned about — making sure that people got it without us, you know, beating them over the head. And they care about Miranda. If caring about her gets the word out to whoever it needs to get to, then we are incredibly successful.

Q: What would you say if your favorite thing about being an actor in general?

A: Wow, wow, wow. I thought that my favorite thing since I was a little girl was being able to give audiences an escape for a little period of time, whether it’s watching a play for two hours, or watching a television show, you get to forget about yourself for that time and then just fully embrace the life of the show that you’re watching.

As I have received this amazing blessing of “Grey’s Anatomy,” I’ve also realized that along with that is also my responsibility to be responsible to my audience because people are watching. That means taking care of me, Chandra Wilson, because people are watching.

I embrace that responsibility because it elevates me to be a little more than an actor. I guess I have that “celebrity” title, and you don’t get to just do whatever you want to do because people are watching, and I embrace that responsibility.