Hostility Linked to Lipid Metabolic Disorder

[Guest guest]

This sounds like it is all about being "inflamed," mentally, emotionally or metabolically.

The blood test called CRP is one way to check inflammatory activity in the body. In theory, taking enough antioxidants can reduce the inflammation involved.

However, it is possible that the power of the mind, out of control with anger, could have a profound effect on increasing inflammation regardless of antioxidant intake, as is seen in high blood pressure that is not effected significantly by antioxidant intake.

Mooney

www.medibolics.comwww.powerusa.org

Dec 28 - A new analysis suggests the association between coronary heart disease (CHD) and hostility could be due to certain physiological mechanisms as well as unhealthy behaviors. Dr. S. Knox of the National Institute of Child Health and Human Development, Bethesda, land and colleagues found that even after adjustment for health behaviors, hostility increased the risk of lipid metabolic disorder (LMD) in women with high or average familial CHD risk, as well as men with high CHD risk.

Past research by Dr. Knox's team with the same cohort found a link between coronary disease endpoints and hostility in men and women at high familial CHD risk, but not in average-risk individuals.

The current finding of an association between hostility and LMD in average-risk individuals as well was "unexpected," they note in their report in the December 13/27 issue of the Archives of Internal Medicine.

Dr. Knox told Reuters Health that she suspects neuroendocrine factors as well as gene-environment interactions could be involved.

The investigators looked at cardiovascular risk factors in men and women participating in the National Heart, Lung and Blood Institute Family Heart Study, including 535 women and 491 men at average familial risk for CVD and 1950 women and 1667 at high risk. The researchers measured hostility with three subscales of the Cook and Medley Hostility Scale.

After adjustment for health behaviors, an association between hostility and LMD and glucose level was seen in the high-risk women, while LMD alone was associated with hostility in women at average risk.

In high-risk men, plasminogen activator inhibitor type 1 levels as well as LMD were tied to hostility, while in average risk men an association was only seen for fibrinogen levels.

Dr. Knox and her colleagues defined LMD as the presence of at least four of the following: systolic blood pressure of 140mm Hg or higher or diastolic blood pressure of 90 or higher; fasting glucose of 126 mg/dL or higher or the use of diabetes medication; BMI of 30 or greater; a triglyceride level of 250 mg/dL or higher; HDL cholesterol below 40 mg/dL for men or 50 mg/dL for women; or LDL of 130 mg/dL or higher.

"Added to the accumulating data on the associations between hostility and cardiovascular morbidity and mortality, these results indicate that further investigation of mechanistic pathways is warranted," the researchers conclude.

Arch Intern Med 2004;164:2442-2448.