Stress control 'lowers risk of heart attack'

PEOPLE with heart disease can avoid future heart attacks if they are taught how to control stress, according to new research.

A type of counselling called cognitive behavioural therapy (CBT) can help people take charge of issues such as marital problems, work stress and money worries, experts said.These "psychosocial" factors account for around a third of the risk of people suffering a heart attack and contribute to heart problems regardless of other factors, such as whether somebody is obese or never exercises.

However, experts believe that helping to relieve some of this stress could prevent future heart attacks in people with heart disease. The latest study, published in the journal Archives of Internal Medicine, was carried out by a team from Uppsala University Hospital in Sweden.

Overall, people receiving CBT had a 41 per cent lower rate of fatal and non-fatal events happening and 45 per cent fewer recurrent heart attacks.