Women are more at risk of developing coronary heart disease than men

It is a fact, stress increases the risk of developing certain pathologies and heart diseases. Researchers from Drexel University in Pennsylvania in the United States have just shown that women are more prone to suffer from coronary heart disease due to stress.

Published in the Journal of the American Heart Association, the results of the study showed that stress linked to certain life events (professional stress, distressing events, etc.) and social tensions is associated with an increased risk of coronary heart disease in the women. To reach this conclusion, the researchers used data from a large-scale women’s health monitoring study, conducted between 1991 and 2015. In total, they analyzed the records of 80,000 postmenopausal women to establish statistics on their health. risk of coronary heart disease.

Of all the women, it emerged that 14% suffered from coronary heart disease during the study. Stress relating to a personal or professional situation was associated with a 12% increase in the risk of coronary heart disease compared to 9% for stress relating to social tensions. The accumulation of social and professional stress leads to a higher risk of 21%. In addition, exposure to work stress and social tension interacted synergistically, resulting in a higher than expected risk of coronary heart disease due to exposure to either stressor alone.

Faced with this, Yvonne Michael, one of the authors of this research, declared: “ My hope is that these results will alert us to the need for better methods of managing stress at work, and that they remind us of the heavy dilemma that rests on women, due to this unpaid domestic work. “. While combating stress may play an important role in preventing coronary heart disease in women, the study authors believe that ” primary prevention strategies including monitoring stress at work, reducing workload and promoting social networks are needed and should receive more attention in the future “. All the more so in an epidemic context as we are currently experiencing with the Covid-19 epidemic which ” highlighted the stress experienced by women in managing paid work and social pressure “.