Contact: Kristina Orth-Gomér
Email: k.orth-gomer@phs.ki.se
Embargoed until: March 15, 2002

BARCELONA, SPAIN-- Women who had been exposed to severe marital stress were about twice more prone to cardiac attacks than women exposed to work stress. This was a finding obtained from The Stockholm Female Coronary Risk Study, a community based case-control study, which examined all Stockholm women patients in productive ages (65 years and under) who were hospitalized in 1991 - 1994. The study focused on women with heart diseases. Three hundred women with coronary syndromes were compared to an equal number of age-matched women of the normal population, by means of psychosocial interview and careful cardiologic examination.

The highest risk, however, was found in women reporting longstanding stress both from marriage and from work. They had a more than five fold risk of a heart attack, compared to women with no or mild stress (Odds Ratio = 5.7).

In an ongoing behavioural intervention trial, efforts are made to develop tools for better coping with both marital and work stress. A pilot study suggests a significant reduction in need for hospitalization among women with coronary disease, who got the behavioural intervention program.

These results will be presented for the first time at the 60th Annual Meeting of the American Psychosomatic Society held March 13-16, 2002 in Barcelona, Spain.

The findings suggest that multiple and conflicting stress and demands from family and work may add up to an excess risk of a heart attack in women. Methods to diminish the risk are being developed and tested.

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