Bad Marriage May Raise Heart Disease Risk!

One of the potential by-products of a bad marriage and other unpleasant personal relationships could be stress, which has also been recognized as a risk factor for heart disease. It is this by-product that may raise the risk of heart disease, reported by a study conducted by University College in London and published on October 8, 2007 in Archives of Internal Medicine.

The study examined 9,011 British civil servants; most of them married, and observed that those with the worst close relationships were 34 percent more likely to have heart attacks or other heart problems during the 12 years of follow-up than those with good relationships. That included not only partners but also close relatives and friends.

The researchers followed previous research that has linked health problems with being single and having few close relationships but focused more on the quality of marriage and other important relationships. The research team tested the participants to see if those with bad relationships had any biological evidence of stress that could contribute to heart disease. That includes inflammation and elevated levels of stress hormones.

Volunteers were asked to fill out questionnaires asking them to rate the person to whom they felt closest on several measures. These included questions regarding to what extent does that person 'give you worries, problems and stress?'

They were also asked about if they felt they could confide in that person, or whether talking with that person made them feel worse. Over the following 12 years, 589 participants had heart attacks or other heart problems. Those with the highest negative scores on the questionnaire had the highest risks, even taking into account other factors related to heart disease such as obesity, high blood pressure and smoking.

Other health experts examining health impact of social relationships feel that this study found only a weak association that does not prove bad relationships can cause heart disease, and it is still not clear what to recommend. Ending a bad marriage is not necessarily the answer given the fact that being unmarried also could be a risk.

While the study revealed that men and women with bad relationships faced equal risks, another similar research found different results.A report published in July 2007 in the journal Psychosomatic Medicine indicated that there was no association between marital woes in general and risks for heart disease or early death. Nevertheless, over a 10-year follow-up, it found that women who keep silent during marital arguments had an increased risk of dying compared with wives who expressed their feelings during fights. This study covered nearly 4,000 men and women and concluded that what appeared to matter more for men was just being married; married men were less likely to die during the follow-up than single men.

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