Hostility predictive of ischemic heart disease

Newman JD. J Am Coll Cardiol. 2011;58:1222-1228.

Observed hostility was associated with an increased risk for incident ischemic heart disease, according to study results.

Researchers assessed the independent relationship between baseline observed hostility and 10-year incident ischemic heart disease (IHD) in 1,749 participants aged at least 18 years in the Canadian Nova Scotia Health Survey. Participants were interviewed and then called back 1 week later for height and weight measurements and to provide a fasting blood sample for measurement of serum lipids. According to the study, primary outcome was the time to first event, “defined as incident fatal or nonfatal IHD as determined by hospitals discharge codes and death certificates.”

During the observation period, 8.5% of patients had incident IHD events, 140 nonfatal and nine fatal. There was a greater risk for incident IHD in participants with observed hostility vs. those without (P=.02), but there was no relation found for patient-reported hostility. After adjusting for CV and psychosocial risk factors, researchers found any observed hostility in participants had a greater risk for incident IHD (HR=2.06; 95% CI, 1.04-4.08). Researchers found observed hostility in patients who were younger (P=.002), more likely to be active smokers (P=.02), had higher levels of self-reported depressive symptoms (P=.02) and had more destructive anger justification (P<.001).

When the researchers looked at correlations between psychosocial measures, patient-reported depression and hostility and observed destructive anger justification was found to be moderately correlated with observed hostility. The Cox proportional hazards regression model showed a statistically significant relationship between observed hostility and IHD (P=.013) when adjusted for age, sex, and Framingham risk score.

Disclosure: Dr. Newman reports no relevant financial disclosures.

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