why political stress could be harming your heart
6 minute read
the larger goal is to reduce your overall stress sensitivity and stress output. by doing so, you can handle any kind of challenge or head-shaking news headlines more ably without taking a toll on your health.
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if you’re feeling unsettled by all the uncertainty in the world, you’re definitely not alone. canadians face a changing government, u.s. tariffs on virtually all our traded goods and energy, and our tariff countermeasures that will have us scouting for non-american and preferably made-in-canada products like peanut butter, spirits, coffee, appliances, cosmetics and clothing (to name a few). jobs will be lost, investment will be dampened and the economy will feel the hit on both sides of the border.
all this political stress could be harming your heart.
“after elections we tend to see an increase in heart attacks. and there are really well controlled studies that have shown that for the week after elections, we see a substantial uptick in myocardial infarctions,” says dr. ahmed tawakol, a cardiologist with a clinical and research focus on cardiovascular imaging at massachusetts general hospital in boston. he’s a pioneer in the field of positron emission tomography (pet) imaging to assess plaque inflammation that causes arteries to narrow and harden, potentially leading to heart attack, stroke or other organ damage. his work has advanced the identification of patients at highest risk for heart attack, stroke and organ disease like dementia, all from this form of vascular inflammation.
chronic stress ages the body and drives heart disease
so, if you’re feeling anxious every time you scroll through your news feed or listen to newscasts, and you do this repeatedly throughout the day, that prolonged stress is not good for your body or your brain. tawakol says that chronic stress ages the body and drives heart disease.
“the stress centres of the brain will drive up the adrenaline parts of the body, the sympathetic nervous system, which drives the heart rate up and blood pressure up,” he says, adding that cortisol also spikes which can increase the risk for obesity, diabetes and hypertension.
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“and then if that’s not bad enough, there are direct lines into the bone marrow where stress tells the bone marrow to produce more inflammatory cells. not only that, the inflammatory cells it tells it to produce are the kinds that are aggressive and produce a lot of the things that increase inflammation.”
as a result, when people are stressed, that’s when their rheumatologic conditions act up or when youth are stressed studying for exams, that’s when they break out with acne (a skin manifestation of inflammation).
stress is unavoidable, but we’re not designed for elevated ongoing stress
while stress is something that we live with and can’t avoid, we’re not necessarily designed for it as a chronic condition. “this stress is supposed to be short-lived. you’re ready to run away from the sabre-toothed tiger, but if you live a stressful life and this is something that is just turned on, non-stop, it has health consequences.”
tawakol points out that there’s nothing wrong with staying informed. he goes to his preferred news sources regularly to read articles online. “i used to spend a lot of time when i’m driving to work listening to the news. and now today i would rather play an audio book or listen to great music,” he says. his personal health-conscious habits reflect the science he uses to help his patients.
the larger goal is to reduce your overall stress sensitivity and stress output. by doing so, you can handle any kind of challenge or head-shaking news headlines more ably without taking a toll on your health. he talks about the concept of neurobiological resilience. while resilience is a general term, the neurobiological aspect denotes that there’s something going on with the biology in your brain that could be changed to allow you to tolerate stressful periods better.
he’s well-versed in the areas of the brain and how they’re impacted by our daily habits.
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“you’ve got the amygdala, which is the part of the brain that just freaks out whenever there is anything that changes in your environment,” he explains. “you want your amygdala to be responsive because you want to have the opportunity to respond to a threat, but you don’t want it to be hyper-responsive where it’s going to literally get you sick. so how do you regulate that? there are upper portions of the brain, especially the prefrontal cortex, the thinking part of the brain, which has robust connections to the amygdala and keeps it quiet like a warm blanket. and the more robust that connection is, the healthier you are as a result.”
you can build neurobiological resilience to handle political stress
he focuses on two strategies to build neurobiological resilience: quieting down the amygdala and strengthening the prefrontal cortex. there are lifestyle habits that stimulate the brain and build a positive mindset.
first, quieting down the amygdala is all about stress reduction and what works for you, like spending time in nature, breathing exercises, meditation or having a warm bath.
then strengthening the prefrontal cortex—which has the side benefit of improving cognitive health as well—includes healthy sleep. “when people don’t sleep enough, they’re more sensitive to things going on in their lives,” he says of their stress centres that are less controlled.
another big one is regular exercise. “we have long known that exercise makes you feel better and people used to think that it’s because you’ve got endorphins. but endorphins are just around for a short period. what actually happens with exercise is that over time it encourages more branching of your neurons in your brain.”
this kind of brain enrichment means that you just skate through something that you would otherwise have jumped at. you quickly develop this sense that the situation is under control and there’s nothing to worry about.
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“beyond those sensations triggering your brain to thinking it’s a problem or not, there’s also what’s happening downstream. how much is your blood pressure going up? how much is your inflammation getting triggered? and that’s the other part of neurobiological resilience. we found that people who have a better balance of prefrontal to amygdala activity, no matter how exposed they are to background stress, they have a lower risk of heart disease,” he says of groundbreaking research his team published in the lancet.
the study involved 293 adults who underwent pet and ct scans at massachusetts general hospital between 2005 and 2008. the scans recorded brain activity, bone marrow activity, spleen activity and inflammation in the heart arteries. the researchers then followed the health of each participant for two to five years, during which 22 of them experienced a cardiovascular disease event, such as a stroke, heart attack or heart failure. analysis of the scans and heart health of each participant revealed that higher activity in the amygdala was associated with a higher risk of a cardiovascular event.
balance following the news with exercise and social activities
tawakol does some exercise activity most days, alternating going to the gym and doing weights with cycling. “i’ll cycle at home when the weather’s not good, and then i’ll go outside to cycle. i think there’s something that i get from when i go outside. i am the happiest little kid on my bicycle when i’m cycling outside.” he also mentions the additional health benefits of socializing and connecting with friends for exercise to bolster resilience.
“resilience doesn’t only mean feeling like you’re handling [stress] well, but it also means that you’re less likely to develop heart disease as a result, for example, or strokes or dementia.”
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ultimately, people can stay younger longer—which is a message that people like to hear.
“we’ve learned that there are so many things that we can do to keep people younger longer,” tawakol says of practicing cardiology. “not only is there an opportunity to help people with surgery and replacing valves and fixing valves and helping them with heart failure. but there’s an opportunity to avoid going down that road in the first place with the preventive strategies, the treatments that we can put into place and recognizing the true strengths of lifestyle interventions.”
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