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A new study has suggested that the stress of a rough relationship or marriage can actually lead to serious heart conditions. Even though it has always been maintained that those who are attached suffer less heart problems than those who aren’t, being in a turbulent relationship is actually worse than being on your own.

The research was conducted on 9,000 British civil servants, all of whom completed questionnaires about their relationships several decades ago. It has now been found that those in negative relationships are 34% more likely to suffer heart problems, according to statistics from the Archives of Internal Medicine. Though not many of the sample had heart disease at the start, almost 600 reported a heart condition subsequently. And the ones who said that conflict, arguments, and criticism were frequent in their relationships were found to be more likely to be in the group of new heart sufferers.

The heads of research believe that the results substantially show that emotional problems really do have an effect on the “wear and tear” of organs, due to problems ranging from hormonal changes to blood clotting. These finds support the views of the British Heart Foundation which has maintained for some time how terrible emotional distress really can be on the heart. As Cathy Ross, a cardiac nurse at the organisation says:

“[the study] reinforces a well-known fact that lack of emotional and psychological support may increase the risk of heart disease. Identifying groups of individuals who are at risk and ensuring psychological support can make a big difference. It allows people to deal with their negative emotions.”

It is all very tragic that the age-old metaphor of a broken heart may hold true. Problems in a relationship not only take an emotional toll but they may end up damaging the very thing from which many have professed to love in the first place.

This entry was posted on Tuesday, October 9th, 2007 at 4:05 pm and is filed under Lifestyle, Science, Health. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.