Work Stress Doubles Risk of Heart Disease Death

Overwork, low pay and poor job prospects can double the risk of dying from heart disease according to a Scandinavian study. The study links work-related stress and heart disease but goes further by stating that ways to improve overall health is to tackle job stress.

In the study 812 healthy men and women with no signs of heart disease who worked in various jobs were flowed for an average of 25 years. During that period 73 of them died from heart disease or strokes.

After taking age and sex into account, employees who faced 'high job strain' - a combination of high demands and little control over the working day - had a 2.2 fold increase in their risk of dying from cardiovascular disease.

Workers whose job involved high demands, low salaries and a lack of social approval had a risk of death from cardiovascular disease 2.4 times higher than those whose jobs involved low stress.

After five years there was an increased risk of raised levels of blood cholesterol associated with job strain and after 10 years there was an increased risk of being overweight.

Professor Mika Kivimaki of the Finnish Institute of Occupational Health states that "Work stress seems to be an independent predictor of death from cardiovascular diseases." He added that "Even after controlling for the effects of conventional cardiovascular risk factors, high work stress was associated with a doubling risk of cardiovascular death."

Workers in the Finnish study who experienced the most adverse effects of pressure were those who remained in the same stressful job with the same employer for five years.