(Ivanhoe Newswire) — Attention sports fans: If your team loses, your heart may be at risk.
Researchers assessed how often emotional stress translates to cardiac death in men, women and older people when their team lost a big game. They ran regression models for mortality rates for cardiac causes for the 1980 Los Angeles Super Bowl loss and the 1984 Los Angeles Super Bowl win.
Results showed the loss of 1980 increased total and cardiac deaths in both men and women and triggered more deaths in older patients. In contrast, a Super Bowl win reduced deaths in older people and women.
Specifically, in men, there was a 15-percent increase in all circulatory deaths associated with the Super Bowl loss. In women, there was a 27-percent increase in all circulatory deaths associated with the loss. In older patients, there was a 22-percent increase in circulatory deaths associated with the loss.
“Physicians and patients should be aware that stressful games might elicit an emotional response that could trigger a cardiac event,” Robert A. Kloner, M.D., Ph.D., of the Heart Institute, Good Samaritan Hospital and Keck School of Medicine at USC, was quoted as saying. “Stress reduction programs or certain medications might be appropriate for individual cases.”
SOURCE: Clinical Cardiology, Jan. 31, 2011
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