Depression and heart disease combo more lethal than either one alone
Effects of depressive symptoms and coronary heart disease and their interactive associations on mortality in middle-aged adults: the Whitehall II cohort study
2010-09-16
(Press-News.org) The combination of depression and heart disease seems to be far more lethal than having either one of these conditions in isolation, suggests research published online in Heart.
Previous research has indicated that people who are depressed, but otherwise healthy, are more likely to develop coronary heart disease, irrespective of what other risk factors they might have.
And people who are depressed are more likely to die from all causes, but it still remains unclear as to whether depression is more fatal for those with heart disease than it is for those without.
The authors base their findings on just under 6,000 middle aged adults, whose mental and physical health were tracked for an average of five and a half years.
All the study participants were taking part in the British Whitehall II study, which is evaluating the impact of social and economic factors on the long term health of around 10,000 civil servants, aged between 35 and 55 in 1985.
Around one in seven of the 6,000 (14.9%) scored highly on a depressive symptom scale. And one in five (20%) of those with established heart disease were depressed compared with one in seven (14%) of those without heart problems.
During the five and a half year monitoring period, 170 people died. Heart attack or stroke accounted for 47 of these deaths.
Those with coronary heart disease alone were 67% more likely to die of all causes, while those who were depressed, but otherwise healthy, were twice as likely to do so as those who had neither condition.
But those who were both depressed and had heart disease were almost five times as likely to die as their mentally and physically healthy peers.
After taking account of age and sex, and other relevant influential factors, the combination of depression and heart disease tripled the risk of death from all causes and quadrupled the risk of dying from a heart attack or a stroke.
The biological explanations for the impact of depression on the risk of death are still not clear, say the authors, but may involve stimulating the inflammatory process and/or clot formation, or altering cellular responses and/or the metabolism of blood fats. Behavioural factors might also play a part, they add.
In the meantime, the results emphasise "the need for healthcare professionals to pay more attention to depression in their cardiac patients," they conclude.
INFORMATION:
END
ELSE PRESS RELEASES FROM THIS DATE:
2010-09-16
Even the lowest possible dose of aspirin (75 mg) can ward off bowel cancer, if taken regularly, finds research published online in the journal Gut.
This protective effect is apparent after just one year and in the general population, not just those considered to be at risk of developing the disease, which is the second most common cause of cancer death in the world, killing almost half a million people every year.
Although previous research has shown that aspirin protects against bowel cancer, it is not known what the most effective dose is and how long it needs to ...
2010-09-16
A study published in the international scientific journal Addiction reveals that restrictions on pub closing times imposed in 2008 within the Australian city of Newcastle have reduced the assault rate by 37 per cent.
The study, conducted at the University of Newcastle, shows the number of assaults in the Central Business District (CBD) fell from 33 per month before the restrictions were put in place, to 22 afterwards.
The team of researchers, led by Associate Professor Kypros Kypri, compared the Newcastle CBD assault rates with those in the nearby suburb of Hamilton, ...
2010-09-16
Policymakers should increase their sense of urgency to stop the global spread of chronic diseases such as heart disease, cancer and diabetes that threaten the health and economies of industrialized and developing nations alike, Emory University global health researchers say.
Writing in the current issue of The New England Journal of Medicine, authors K. M. Venkat Narayan, MD, Mohammed Ali, MBChB, MSc, and Jeffrey Koplan, MD, MPH, assert that the worldwide spread of chronic conditions, also known as noncommunicable diseases, offers a unique opportunity for low-, middle- ...
2010-09-16
Rosemont, Ill. – Several health plans have introduced physician rating systems to offer consumers more information when choosing their doctors. However, a recent study presented in the September issue of the Journal of Bone and Joint Surgery (JBJS) reveals that physician-tiering guidelines and results are not consistent across insurance companies, do not fully define quality; and could confuse consumers.
Since affordable and more accessible health care is a critical national challenge, the use of rating systems will increase as one response to rising costs. Doctors ...
2010-09-16
Simply getting older is not the cause of mild memory lapses often called senior moments, according to a new study by researchers at the Rush Alzheimer's Disease Center. The study, published in the September 15, 2010, online issue of Neurology, the medical journal of the American Academy of Neurology, found that even the very early mild changes in memory that are much more common in old age than dementia are caused by the same brain lesions associated with Alzheimer's disease and other dementias.
"The very early mild cognitive changes once thought to be normal aging ...
2010-09-16
In the Life After Cancer Epidemiology (LACE) study, 1,897 participants diagnosed with early-stage breast cancer between 1997 and 2000 and recruited on average 2 years post-breast cancer diagnosis were evaluated for the association between alcohol intake and breast cancer recurrence and death. The women, who were generally light drinkers, were followed for an average of 7.4 years. The study reported an increase in risk of breast cancer recurrence and breast cancer death, but no effect on total mortality, to be associated with consumption of 3 to 4 or more drinks per week ...
2010-09-16
AUDIO:
When men outnumber women, the women tend to marry younger and men engage in riskier, more aggressive behavior.
Click here for more information.
ANN ARBOR, Mich..---When men outnumber women, females marry younger and the age gap between spouses grows, a University of Michigan study shows.
"Women don't stay on the market long because men are more motivated to commit," said Daniel Kruger, research assistant professor in the U-M School of Public Health. "They want to secure ...
2010-09-16
OAK RIDGE, Tenn., Sept. 15, 2010 -- New insight into the structure of switchgrass and poplars is fueling discussions that could result in more efficient methods to turn biomass into biofuel.
Researchers from the Department of Energy's Oak Ridge National Laboratory and Georgia Tech used small-angle neutron scattering to probe the structural impact of an acid pretreatment of lignocellulose from switchgrass. Pretreatment is an essential step to extract cellulose, which can through a series of enzymatic procedures be converted into sugars and then ethanol. The findings, published ...
2010-09-16
Air Force Office of Scientific Research-sponsored researcher, Dr. Robert Wood of Harvard University is leading the way in what could become the next phase of high-performance micro air vehicles for the Air Force.
His basic research is on track to evolve into robotic, insect-scale devices for monitoring and exploration of hazardous environments, such as collapsed structures, caves and chemical spills.
"We are developing a suite of capabilities which we hope will lead to MAVs that exceed the capabilities of existing small aircraft. The level of autonomy and mobility ...
2010-09-16
(PHILADELPHIA) A molecule known to be involved in progressive heart failure has now been shown to also lead to permanent damage after a heart attack, according to researchers at Thomas Jefferson University.
To prove this novel conclusion, the research team used gene therapy to inhibit the small protein, kinase known as G protein-coupled receptor kinase 2 (GRK2), and found heart muscles cells in mice were substantially protected against destruction that would otherwise occur after an induced myocardial infarction (MI), or heart attack.
Conversely, mice engineered to ...
LAST 30 PRESS RELEASES:
[Press-News.org] Depression and heart disease combo more lethal than either one alone
Effects of depressive symptoms and coronary heart disease and their interactive associations on mortality in middle-aged adults: the Whitehall II cohort study
