Heart Failure Patients Compounded By Depression Risk Health
Psychological depression appears to contribute to worse medical outcomes for patients with heart failure, ranking it in importance with such risk factors as high cholesterol, hypertension, and even the ability of the heart to pump blood throughout the body.
After taking into account such factors as disease severity, the strength of the heart muscle contractions, the underlying cause for the heart failure, age and medication use, a team of Duke University Medical Center and University of North Carolina researchers found that symptoms of depression were common in this population.
More to it, they´ve also found that depressed patients were over 50 percent more likely to die or be hospitalized for their heart condition than patients who were not depressed.
Researchers still don’t understand why depressed heart patients have worse outcomes. Among possible factors, depressed patients are known to have overly active immune systems, a decrease in the ability of their blood platelets to clot properly and a decrease in their heart’s ability to react appropriately to the stresses of everyday life.
In an attempt to better understand the role of depression , read more here.