A lot of people ask me whether stress can cause heart disease or whether anger can cause a heart attack. People who are under stress cannot sleep well and cannot exercise because the body is tired. some people resort to smoking to relieve stress, others eat a lot of food to overcome bad moods.

People who are stressed become weaker due to the lack of exercise and too much food, which can cause high blood pressure, as well as high blood sugar and cholesterol levels. Smoking makes it even more likely for the person to have narrowed arteries.

However, if a stressed person deals with stress by exercising rather than smoking and/or bingeing, the chances of developing heart disease isn’t much higher than a non-stressed person. It only matters that you know when you are stressed.

As for anger, it can cause a heart attack because anger raises you blood pressure instantly, especially in emotionally unstable people. the heart will beat faster and blood pressure will go through the roof when you are really angry. You can see that angry people are red-faced. have someone take a photo of you when you are angry and you will see that you look like you are about to eat someone alive. Older people with heart problems should avoid getting angry. Buddhist meditation is a really good practice to control your anger.

When anger rises, adrenaline is released, making the heart beat faster, the blood pressure rise and the coronary arteries contract.

A study was done in fully fed cats who were later angered. It was found that food lingered in their stomachs for three to six hours longer. This means anger can cause indigestion.

Anger makes the heart unclear. It happens when the person encounters something unpleasant. if the emotion cannot be controlled, anger rises. It can eventually lead to a heart attack. Once anger visits and the person holds on to it (without knowing), it eats the heart up with negative thoughts and bad wishes for the other person, such as hoping for failure and illness to befall the person. Vengeance can also cause stress, which in turn causes narrowing of the arteries _ and you are another step closer to death.

There are many ways to get over anger, but we neglect to consider them because most of the times we don’t even know we are angry. To name a few ways, you can realise the negative effects of anger, have mercy on the person you are angry with, and think that it was a result of something you’ve done to the person in the past. do not respond to anger with anger because it will be your loss.

A patient of mine in his early 50s had chronic high blood pressure. He was rather plump as he didn’t like to exercise. His blood sugar level had also been high for years, but he never had any treatment before he came to see me about a stabbing pain in the right side of his chest, which he often felt after he fought with his wife, and the pain would last five to 10 minutes.

Later, he found out it was because of his anger, because whenever he felt angry, he would feel pain in his chest. He solved the problem by walking away from his wife as soon as it started.

I recommended a contrast agent injection to ascertain if his coronary artery could be treated with balloon angioplasty, but he did not want this, so I gave him some medication to help with the problem. His symptoms persisted (did his wife follow him when he walked away?), so he had be admitted to hospital. He still refused a contrast agent injection. He told me that he had hearing problems. if he walked away far enough, he wouldn’t hear his wife, and his anger would fade away! Good to know he realised his own anger.

One day, he was taken to hospital in the middle of the night due to acute myocardial infarction, a heart attack and protracted chest pain. He said it happened after a fight with his wife _ yet again! _ but when he tried to walk away, she followed him. He got so angry that he was shaking, his face turned red (according to his children) and suddenly he was caught by a pain in his chest, and his pills couldn’t help.

That time, he spent more days in the hospital because of acute myocardial infarction and he also had heart failure. His heart was working at only 30% and he needed to depend on urine medication and blood pressure medication for days.

A Doppler colour test did not found any clogging in the heart muscles’ arteries. I assumed that when he got angry, the blood vessels contracted so much that blood did not reach his heart muscles, causing myocardial infarction.

His hearing problem also worsened before he returned home. It could have been a side effect of the treatment. I asked him to see an ear specialist, but he refused.

After that, he did not have any chest pain, but his hearing problem grew worse. I had to yell into his ear to make him understand what I said. Every time he came to see me, I ended up with a sore throat! however, I noticed that he was much calmer. His children also said that he no longer fought with his wife. When I asked (at the top of my voice) what his secret was, he shouted back, “It’s easy! My hearing is so bad I can’t hear my wife nag anymore!”

Dr Nithi Mahanonda is a consultant cardiologist and interventionist at Perfect Heart Institute, Piyavate Hospital.

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