Professionals – A High Risk Group for Coronary Events?

Professionals – a high risk group for coronary events?

Are professionals a high risk group for coronary events? Here are some of the potential risk factors in professionals:

Stress
Sedentary lifestyle
Lack of exercise
Sleep deprivation
Irregular food habits
Smoking
Type A Personality

Professionals with type A personality have a higher risk for cardiac events. Type A personality is characterized by the following features:
Impatience and time urgency
Strong desire to achieve more in less time
Free floating hostility – ever irritated
Unwarranted anger, unable to relax
Have many ‘to do lists’ that never end
Highly competitive, very ambitious

Type B personality has almost the opposite features of type A personality. It is the hostility component of type A personality which is cardiotoxic and coronary prone. In a study in which hostility was measured in 1,877 employed men and observed for 10 year incidence of myocardial infarction or coronary mortality and adjusted for age, blood pressure, cholesterol, smoking and alcohol usage, found that there was a 42% difference between the highest and lowest quintiles of hostility.

Another study assessed 3200 healthy males, and stress-prone individuals (Type A) were identified as those with anger & hostility, competitiveness and time-urgency.They were reassessed after 8½ years. 257 had developed coronary artery disease, of whom 70% had Type A personality. This association remained even when smoking and other lifestyle factors were accounted for.

Type C Personality

Those with type C personality suppress their emotions, especially the negative ones. They are unassertive, likeable and rarely argumentative. They wish to please others and are generally helpful to others. But the suppression of emotions have negative physiological consequences for the individuals with type C personality. Their immune system may be suppressed and may lead to a higher risk of cancer.

Type D Personality

They are gloomy, socially inept and worriers. Type D personality is associated with greater risk of heart attack. Those who already had a myocardial infarction are four times likely to have another one in the next ten years. They have a distressed personality, associated with depression and social alienation. Several recent studies have focussed on type D personality and their higher coronary risk.