Anger doubles risk of heart attack . Harvard's Murray Mittleman, M.D., questioned 1,122 men and 501 women who had had heart attacks about what they'd been feeling shortly beforehand. Many had felt intense anger. Mittleman calculated that anger raised heart attack risk 2.3 times, and that risk remained high for about two hours after the anger-trigering event. Other studies have shown that anger increases heart rate and raise blood pressure, both of which can contribute to heart attack.
Job stress increases atherosclerosis .
Finnish researchers surveyed 591 employed, middle-aged men about their workplace stress and gagued their amount of atherosclerosis using an ultrasound exam of their carotid arteries, the ones that carry blood up to the brain. Four years later, the researchers repeated the ultrasound exams. Those whose arteries had narrowed the most were the ones under the most stress at work. Job stress doubles risk of heart attack . If you've ever been fired from a job, perhaps you've wished ill on your ex-boss.