Heart Disease in Western Society

Heart disease is perhaps the nation's most prevalent killer of men and women and it may be one of the most easily preventable diseases of the modern civilization in the 40 to 70 age group.Some heart disease risk factors you can control and some you cannot. Coronary artery disease causes roughly 1.2 million heart attacks each year, and more than forty percent of those suffering from a heart attack will die. Even more worrisome, 335,000 people with heart attacks will die in an emergency department or before ever reaching the hospital. According to the American Heart Association, over 7 million Americans have suffered a heart attack in their lifetime.

Anger and stress contibute to coronary heart disease.The analysis of 2,334 men and women aged 45-64 years also found that long-term stress is associated with increased risk of coronary heart disease in both men and women.Specifically, researchers found that men with high trait anger scores had 1.7 times greater odds for developing hypertension than those with low or moderate scores, and high trait anger scores were associated with a 90 percent increase in the risk of progression to coronary heart disease in prehypertensive men.Moreover, both men and women with high levels of long-term psychological stress had 1.68 times greater odds for developing coronary heart disease than those with low or moderate stress.

There are other several risk factors for heart disease, some are controllable others are not. Uncontrollable risk factors include male sex, older age, family history of heart disease, postmenopausal and race (African Americans, American Indians, and Mexican Americans are more likely to have heart disease than Caucasians).Still, there are many risk factors that can be controlled. By making changes in your lifestyle, you can actually reduce your risk for heart disease. Controllable risk factors include smoking, high LDL, or "bad" cholesterol and low HDL, or "good" cholesterol, uncontrolled hypertension (high blood pressure), physical inactivity, obesity (more than 20% over one's ideal body weight), uncontrolled diabetes and high C-reactive protein.

The authors suggest that treatment of anger and psychological stress may have a beneficial effect on slowing progression coronary heart disease. Different stress management techniques such as meditation, anger management, and even being among friends are great ways to help in the cure for heart disease. Many studies indicate that joining a support group and having the encouragement of family and friends is a fantastic way to help beat this disease.

Indra Andriana 10205034