Can Stress Lead to Heart Disease

A lot of people believe that stress leads to heart disease, but is there any truth to this belief? If stress does increase heart disease risk factors, what kind of stress are we talking about? For regular people, stress is often seen as emotional problems at work or at home. However, medical professionals say that stress has to do with physical health factors.

Physical stress is actually seen as something good since it is measurable. Exercise, for example, raises the heart rate and can be measured by counting your daily steps. But if you lead an inactive life, the introduction of physical stress isn’t exactly great. In fact, it can become one of the heart disease risk factors.

As long as you are healthy, physical stress is good. But with a lazy lifestyle, doctors will need to introduce you to exercise in order to prevent heart disease.

If heart disease is in your genes or remains undetected, intense exercise will be detrimental for your well-being. Physical stress may cause chest pain, dizziness or fainting, if your heart does not get enough oxygen to work properly. As long as you are in good health, however, exercising and other physical activities should be fine.

When people talk about stress, they oftentimes refer to emotional things, such as a problem at work, a death of a loved one, etc. But how does this affect the heart physically, if it even does? Although emotional stress is definitely harmful, there are still no links to whether this is one of the heart disease risk factors.

Most of the time, heart disease is only incidental when related to emotional stress. Unexpected and huge life changes where emotions go into frenzy may lead to heart disease, but most experts believe that this is predisposed. Does it directly have anything to do with heart disease, though?

Emotional stress is unavoidable but is not necessarily bad. Emotional stress usually leads to a learning experience, most of all when released in a healthy way. Those who have severe emotional angst, however, are more likely to suffer from heart disease.

Stress needs to be released, not kept in; otherwise this could lead to overeating, smoking and drinking, and eventually heart disease. Plus, the ups and downs of adrenaline could work the heart muscle and cause blood clotting that could also lead to heart disease.

Stress does not necessarily lead to heart disease, per se, but it could lead to lifestyle choices that could affect the outcome of heart disease. It is recommended to find exercise programs to help release stress or find someone to talk to, as this could help prevent heart disease in the long run.