http://kopasnews.com/2011/09/depression-increases-stroke-risk-study-says/
Depression increases stroke risk, study says
People with depression are more likely to suffer a stroke than their mentally healthy, and his punches are more likely to be fatal, according to a new analysis published this week in the Journal of the American Medical Association.
Depression is a relatively minor risk factor for stroke compared to high blood pressure (hypertension) and other health conditions and behaviors that damage the blood vessels, researchers say. However, their analysis suggests that at least 4% of the approximately 795,000 movements that occur in the United States each year can be attributed to depression.
“If you have depression, but no other health problems, you may not have to pay much attention to the risk of stroke,” says a Pan, Ph.D., lead author of the analysis and a researcher at Harvard University Public Health in Boston. “But if you are depressed and are obese or have hypertension or … the factors of unhealthy lifestyle, the risk will increase dramatically.”
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Pan and colleagues combined data from 28 studies dating from the 1990s that included about 318,000 people in total. Approximately 2.7% of participants had a stroke during the studies, which lasted from two to 29 years.
Compared to those who showed no signs of depression, people who were diagnosed with depression by a physician or who reported being depressed were 45% more likely to have a stroke and 55% more likely to die of a stroke, the researchers said.
Depression increases the risk of ischemic stroke, in which a blood vessel is blocked and can not send blood to the brain. But not measurably increase the risk of other major type, hemorrhagic stroke, in which there is leakage or blood vessel bursts.
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The new study is the latest in a long line of research linking depression with chronic and serious physical health problems.
“We knew that depression increases a person’s risk of developing diabetes, obesity, hypertension and cardiovascular disease,” Pan said “We also knew that depression can occur after patients suffer a stroke. Just do not have strong enough evidence know if the opposite happens, or what really comes first. ”
Researchers have established that depression increases the risk of heart attacks (and especially fatal), so it makes sense that depression may have a similar association with the movement, says Norman Rosenthal, MD, clinical professor of psychiatry at School of Medicine at Georgetown University in Washington, DC
“Stroke and heart attacks both represent the blood vessels become blocked and the blood that is being held in a vital organ, either the heart or brain,” says Rosenthal, who was not involved in the new study. “They’re essentially the same disease.”
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Depression may contribute to shock in many ways, Pan says. For starters, people who are depressed are more likely to smoke or drink excessively, to follow an unhealthy diet, and neglect their personal health. Most of the studies included in the analysis of control for these and other risk factors, but the data suggest that at least some of the risk of stroke in people with depression can be explained by an unhealthy lifestyle.
There are other possibilities also are not as easily measured. Depression may increase the production of stress hormones in the body, for example, and can cause dangerous inflammation of blood vessels. “Small things, like maintaining good dental hygiene or with friends, affect the levels of inflammation – and these are things that a depressed person is less likely to do,” says Rosenthal.
Depression can make people lazy to take the drugs needed to control other conditions related to stroke such as diabetes or high blood pressure. In addition, some prescription drugs for depression – especially the class of drugs known as atypical antipsychotics – have been shown to cause weight gain and obesity, a risk factor for stroke.
More research is needed to determine if depression medications contribute to the risk of stroke. Physicians should monitor weight gain and blood pressure levels in patients taking these drugs, but there is no reason why patients stop taking them, Pan says. “For now, physicians should prescribe medication if they think necessary, or if non-pharmacological treatments have not worked.”
Although depression is not the most important risk factor for stroke, researchers say it is likely to have a significant impact on the rate of stroke. They believe that depression is an additional charge of 106 strokes per 100,000 people in the United States each year.
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