Heart Disease Prevention - The Relationship Between Anxiety And Heart Disease!

Being part of life, anxiety is one thing that every human being will encounter from time to time. Sometimes it can be motivating. But it needs to be balanced out by parasympathetic nervous system activity. Unfortunately, some people with anxiety do not have such balance, and this could hurt the heart over time. Find out more at:

https://www.howtopreventheartdisease.com/the-relationship-between-anxiety-and-heart-disease.html

Heart Disease Prevention - What Are Emerging Risk Factors Of Heart Disease?

In recent years, researchers have revealed links between a number of health and lifestyle issues and elevated risk of heart disease. Sleep quality, emotional problems, pregnancy complications, gum disease and chronic inflammation conditions are some of the issues found. Apparently, the general public is not aware of these emerging issues. Find out more at:

https://www.howtopreventheartdisease.com/what-are-emerging-risk-factors-of-heart-disease.html

How Does Panic Attack Differ From Heart Attack?

Heart attack is a serious condition that occurs as a result of coronary heart disease. It requires immediate medical attention, otherwise the victim might end up with disability or even death. Panic attack, on the other hand, is a form of anxiety that is triggered by a stressful event, and it poses no immediate danger.

Both attacks have very similar symptoms making it difficult for anyone to differentiate. However, they are some key differences. For instance, both attack sufferers can have intense chest pain. Chest pain associated with an actual heart attack is often described as crushing. The feeling may radiate into the rest of the chest, arms, back, neck, and even teeth. Chest pain during a panic attack tends to feel more localized. It is more limited to a certain area of the chest.

Meanwhile, the symptoms are more likely to surprise one with a sudden onset in a panic attack. Symptoms typically only last around 10 minutes. A heart attack may start with minor discomfort, and builds up into severe pain over a few minutes. It can last up to a couple of hours. A 5- to 10-minute of deep, active breathing should loosen up the tightened chest, and the panic attack will slowly start to subside. If after 5-minutes of breathing, the body has not shown any signs of improvement, then it may be a heart attack. 

Nausea may occur in both heart attack and panic attack. It is more common for heart attack sufferers to end up vomiting though it can rarely occur in some panic attack victims, too. People with panic attack may have an intense feeling of fear or anxiety, and they are more likely to have hyperventilation.

It is less common for those with panic attack to faint, but victims of heart attack can always experience lightheadedness or even lose consciousness. Panic attack usually starts in the younger ages, and heart attack tends to happen to those with ill health, who are obese and those in the elderly.

A heart attack can actually lead to a panic attack due to the fear and anxiety but a panic attack cannot cause heart attack. Nevertheless, if one has an underlying heart issue, panic attack may stress the body and can aggravate an existing heart condition. So, people who have an existing heart condition should talk to their doctor if they are experiencing panic attack.

Diagnosis of panic attack patients include a psychological evaluation using questionnaires or consultations with a psychiatrist. But doctors must first rule out a heart attack, stroke or asthma attack before a panic disorder can be considered. Treatment for panic attack can be carried out through a combination of drugs and therapy. Patients on medication often show marked improvement. Therapy that involves challenging unhelpful thoughts or relaxation techniques like breathing exercises can also help.

Can Healthy Habits Counter Stress?

While stress can be positive, it becomes negative when it continues without relief until a condition called distress occurs. Distress can cause physical symptoms including headaches, upset stomach, elevated blood pressure, chest pain, and sleeping problems.

Stress can also lead to or worsen certain symptoms or diseases, including high blood pressure, heart disease, diabetes, skin conditions, depression and anxiety. It is estimated that 43 percent of all adults suffer stress related health ailments.

A paper published on May 13, 2013 in the ‘Canadian Medical Association Journal’ by researchers from the University College London and other institutions reported that job strain was linked to a 25 percent higher chance of getting a heart attack or dying of heart problems. But the risks could be cut by 50 percent among people, either stressed or otherwise, who maintained a healthy lifestyle comparing to those who drank, smoked or were obese. Job stress was defined in the study as having a lot of demands at work with little control.

Though people have been encouraged to reduce work stress for heart disease prevention, this is sometimes unrealistic for certain group of people. As such, researchers were eager to find out whether adopting an otherwise healthy lifestyle would reduce heart disease risk among those with job strain.

Using data gathered from 7 European studies that surveyed 107,200 people about their general lifestyle habits that included how much strain they were under at work, the researchers found that about 1 in 6 initially reported being under job strain. None of these participants had heart disease at the start of the study.

Over the next 7 years, on average, there were about 1,100 heart attacks or deaths from heart disease. Over a decade, it was found that 12 cases per 1,000 generally healthy people without job strain and 31 per 1,000 people with job strain and multiple lifestyle risks like rarely exercising or having more than 3 or 4 alcoholic drinks a day.

Analysis also showed that approximately 4 percent of all heart attacks and deaths from heart disease could be due to job strain and about 26 percent to drinking, smoking, obesity and lack of physical activity.

Nevertheless, the new study might underestimate the link between job strain and heart disease. Furthermore, other types of job stress that may influence heart risks, like having low social support and job insecurity, were not taken into account.

The new study also did not prove that pressure at work causes heart problems, though the results are in tandem with past studies that suggested chronic stress, including from job strain, could have negative health effects.

Meanwhile, the American Heart Association (AHA) also advise people with stress to adopt positive healthy habits that include performing daily physical activity, giving up bad habits, getting enough sleep and trying not to worry.

Neuroticism Might Lead to Heart Disease!

Neuroticism can be defined as an enduring tendency to experience negative emotional states. A neurotic person tends to experience negative feeling such as anger, anxiety, depression and guilt. People who are neurotic are worrisome and might have emotional vicissitudes. They simply could not respond to environmental stress appropriately and more likely to interpret ordinary situations as threatening and minor frustrations as hopelessly difficult.

In comparison, extroversion is the act, state, or habit of being predominantly concerned with and obtaining gratification from what is outside the self. Extroversive people are friendly and outgoing. They not only enjoy human interactions but also are enthusiastic, talkative, assertive and gregarious. A person, who is extroversive, is more likely to enjoy their time spent with people.

Researchers from the University of Edinburgh in Scotland reported in December 2007 in the Journal “Psychosomatic Medicine” that neuroticism could cause heart disease. To clarify the effects on heart by both neuroticism and extroversion, they looked at mortality in 5,424 middle-aged adults, who were followed for 21 years after they completed personality tests.

The findings revealed that an increasing degree of neuroticism was related to a higher risk of dying from any cause. However, the relationship disappeared after adjustments were made for other relevant factors like body weight, use of alcohol, social class and education. Furthermore, the risk of death from cardiovascular disease was higher when a person’s level of neuroticism rose. Such relationship was still significant even after statistical adjustment.

On the other hand, the researchers found that extraversion tended to reduce a person’s chance of dying from respiratory disease, although extraversion had no other effects on mortality.

In conclusion, the researchers believed that the link between neuroticism and death of cardiovascular disease could be related to gene, though the socioeconomic and behavioral factors should be included as well.

Listen to Your Favorite Music to Prevent Heart Disease!

Listening to music could be an alternative way to help people with hypertension lowers their blood pressure. This was the findings of a study by the University of Florence in Italy reported at the American Society of Hypertension meeting in New Orleans in May 2008. Although high blood pressure is a risk factor for heart disease, the study did not provide any evidence that linked directly with heart disease.

Recently, a research team at the University Of Maryland School Of Medicine, who was also involved in a 2005 study that noted the cardiovascular benefits of laughter, reported that listening to favorite music could actually help maintain a healthy heart.

Their findings were announced at the 2008 Scientific Sessions of the American Heart Association in New Orleans on November 11, 2008. The researchers claimed that they had shown for the first time the emotions aroused by music enjoyed by the listener could be beneficial to a healthy blood vessel function.

The study, which involved 10 healthy, non-smoking volunteers, had noted highly significant differences both before and after listening to joyful music as well as between joyful and anxious music.

In fact, they found that by allowing these volunteers to listen to music that gave them a sense of joy, their inner-lining tissues of blood vessels would expand, which aided blood flow to increase. Such response matched those found in the 2005 study of laughter.

In order to minimize desensitization of emotions felt by listening to their favorite music, participants were told not to listen to the pieces for a minimum of 2 weeks before the test. The reason behind this was that when they listened to the pieces they really enjoyed, they would get an extra boost of whatever emotion generated.

It was found that after listening to joyful music, the diameter of the average upper arm blood vessel was increased by 26 percent. On the other hand, the diameter was narrowed by 6 percent after listening to music that caused anxiety.

Furthermore, the study also noted that the physiological impact of music might also affect the activity of the ‘feel good’ brain chemicals known as ‘endorphins’.

It is hoped that the findings would inspire people to incorporate ‘listening to favorite music’ as a preventive strategy for heart disease prevention in their daily lives.

Will Weight Loss Drugs Benefit Obese Patients?

While some doctors do agree upon the difficulty to help overweight or obese patients lose weight successfully by taking weight loss drugs alone, others would think that the few kilos loss would make a significant difference for patients suffering from heart disease or diabetes problems. Nevertheless, those people who take the drugs for cosmetic reasons may not see much benefit.

A study carried out by researchers from the University of Alberta in Canada revealed that patients on weight loss drugs might lose little more than their money, and yet face many unpleasant side effects. The report, which was published in the “British Medical Journal” on November 16, 2007, indicated that close to 20,000 patients, weighing an average of 100 kilos lost less than 5 kilos because of these weight loss drugs. These patients had been on one of 3 weight loss drugs, Xenical, Reductil and Accomplia for one to 4 years.

The meta-analysis using data from 30 clinical trials found that up to 30 percent of the patients on Xenical had unpleasant digestive and intestinal side effects, such as incontinence. On average, they lost 3 kilos.

Patients who took Reductil lost 4 kilos and had improved cholesterol levels, but up to 20 percent of the patients suffered from high blood pressure, raised pulse rates, insomnia and nausea.

Accomplia was most effective as patients taking this drug lost the most weight, 5 kilos on average along with improved blood pressure and cholesterol levels. Nevertheless, the 6 percent of the patients had an increased risk of mood disorders.

In fact, another study reported also on November 16, 2007 in medical journal “The Lancet that patients who were prescribed Accomplia were very likely to suffer from depression, anxiety and even suicidal tendencies.

The worldwide annual sales of these 3 medicines is closed to US$1.2 billion. These drugs are meant for severely obese people, and many of them suffer from or are at higher risk of heart disease and diabetes.

Despite the side effects, which were explicitly listed by the drug manufacturers, many doctors do prescribed them to selected patients. According to their argument, fat people who lose 4 kilos could cut their risk of getting diabetes by 30 to 40 percent, and for those already suffer from diabetes, 4 kilos loss in weight would cut their blood sugar level and their risk of getting heart disease.

How Governments Can Help Combat Chronic Diseases?

In the recent WHO (World Health Organization) meeting held in Singapore during November 2007, ways to improve the prevention and control of chronic diseases were explored.

'It is easier to walk or ride a bicycle if there are green areas and bicycle paths in a city; it is easier to eat healthy food if we have healthy foods to choose from, if they are easy to find, affordable and promoted as desirable.' This was the statement made by Mr Shigeru Omi, WHO's regional director.

In his opinion, he believes that all risk factors for diseases can be drastically reduced by government through legislation, policy and regulation, and by industry through appropriate use of nutrition knowledge, food technology and marketing techniques.

He also stressed that it is cheaper to prevent problems than to treat them, but he admitted that this is a problem that many low and middle income countries face. Nevertheless, some countries were praised for their efforts in getting citizens to live healthier lives.

For example, obesity and traffic accidents are lower in the Netherlands than in many European countries because cycling is popular, both as recreation and transportation. Promotion and commitment to healthy diets had earned praise for Australia and New Zealand. In New Zealand, 'fruits in school' programme was launched in all primary schools in 2005.

In Singapore, the effort in fighting obesity has achieved and sustained reduction in obesity rates over a number of years. The key causes for disability in Singapore were chronic diseases like diabetes, heart disease, stroke, anxiety and depression and cancer. As such, Singapore has launched the nationwide subsidized health screening for people of 50 years old and above for high blood pressure, high cholesterol levels and diabetes. Government also allowed people to use 'Medisave' to pay for treatment for chronic ailments. This year will be the first year for the programme and it is expected that some 90,000 patients will draw S$15 million from their Medisave.

In order to help more people have their problems diagnosed early, screening programmes will be stepped up by the government.