Well, it's the day after Tax Day, so this may come too late. But maybe not. In the minds of many, taxes equal stress. And walking away from stress, or at least preventing stress from dominating your thoughts and actions, can be hard. The payoffs, however, look like they can be great. Increasingly, medical doctors are signing on to the long-held notion that psychological stress is damaging to our hearts, especially when that stress is continual and perpetuated by people through “brooding” about whatever is causing the stress. While stress is hard to define and admittedly subjective, as a fascinating paper published in the April 1 edition of the Journal of the American College of Cardiology attests, it is a fact of life for all of us. Stress, in fact, can be as great a risk factor as cholesterol, or even greater, depending on a person's vulnerability. But it is an oversimplification, author Dr. Joel Dimsdale writes, to say that stress causes heart disease. OK. So he and the literature he uses in his paper stop short of drawing that very straight line. No matter: The point is crystal clear. There are adverse effects on the heart from stress, especially psychological stress. Job stress, unhappy marriages, caring for an acutely ill spouse. All can spell trouble for those who suffer from these circumstances of life and do little or nothing to offset the negative impacts. On job stress; Studies the author reviewed “seem to suggest that the job-stressed patient is primed to hyper-respond to stressors even outside of the work environment.” In other words, he or she can't turn it off, particularly those who have little control over their jobs, are competitive, hostile and overcommitted at work, and face poor promotion prospects and blocked careers. As for marital stress, studies have shown a tendency toward increased cardiovascular disease, especially among those who were also unhappy at work. And as for care-giving patients? Well, those who were looking after a spouse with dementia - “one of the most frequent and harrowing scenarios” - had a 63 percent higher mortality rate than non-care-giving control subjects used in one study. But there is good news that even cardiologists are acknowledging! While the author is reluctant to say that such measures as meditation are proven to prevent heart attacks and cardiac death, he gives thumbs-up to this and other interventions - such as progressive relaxation - for improving well-being and reducing suffering. “The therapeutic nihilists are wrong,” he writes. So, back off, those of you who turn your back on such approaches. No harm, no foul. In fact, he apparently witnessed a study where a patient who was being injected with a medication that was raising heart rate “got bored with the testing and started quietly meditating. No increased heart rate was detected!” Therefore, the author concludes, this provided “graphic detail of the potential powers of behavioral intervention to block even pharmacologic (drug) stress effects.” Conclusion? If you are under stress, meditate, breathe mindfully, exercise or see a therapist. Do whatever you can to take that burden off your heart. - Cox News Service __
