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Social Relationships and Cardiovascular Disease

Negative aspects of close relationships may be bad for your heart.

Interest in the extent to which psychosocial factors influence the epidemiology of cardiovascular disease is growing. Although some studies suggest that individuals with social support are less likely to develop CVD than those without social support, evidence of a positive association between being married and CVD raises the possibility that the quality of social relationships affects CVD incidence.

Investigators used a validated questionnaire to study the relation between CVD and negative aspects of social relationships in a cohort of 9011 middle-aged U.K. civil servants free of CVD at baseline. Over a mean follow-up period of 12.2 years, participants who reported negative aspects of social relationships had a significantly higher risk for incident CVD events than those who did not report such negative aspects (hazard ratio, 1.34), after accounting for differences in demographic characteristics, health behaviors, and CVD risk factors. This association remained significant (HR, 1.25) after adjustment for other psychosocial factors (e.g., depressive symptoms). These findings were consistent regardless of sex or social standing. Incident CVD was not associated with other aspects of social relationships — specifically, confiding behaviors, emotional support, and practical support.

Comment: This study’s findings add to a growing body of evidence identifying negative aspects of social relationships as important correlates of CVD occurrence. Although nonadherence to preventive interventions by patients with negative aspects of relationships could explain the study findings, the independence of this association from other health behaviors raises the possibility of a biological connection between psychosocial factors and CVD. Until better information is available on how negative relationships affect heart health, however, the clinical relevance of these results is limited.

— Frederick A. Masoudi, MD, MSPH

Published in Journal Watch Cardiology November 7, 2007

Citation(s):

De Vogli R et al. Negative aspects of close relationships and heart disease. Arch Intern Med 2007 Oct 8; 167:1951.

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