Anxiety is linked to several cardiometabolic conditions, including coronary heart disease, stroke, diabetes, and hypertension. The reasons behind these links and how they develop, however, remain unclear.
Some studies have shown that people who are anxious develop increased cardiometabolic risk factors, such as a steeper rise in body mass index (BMI), as they age.
Other research suggests that deterioration in cardiometabolic health occurs relatively early in the life of anxious individuals and that this lasts into older age.
Establishing how exactly this link works is difficult, as few cohort studies have recorded longitudinal data on anxiety alongside a broad range of cardiometabolic outcomes.
In a recent study, researchers at the Boston University School of Medicine led a team of scientists investigating the link between cardiometabolic outcomes and indicators of anxiety.
“Our findings indicate [that] higher levels of anxiousness or worry among men are linked to biological processes that may give rise to heart disease and metabolic conditions, and these associations may be present much earlier in life than is commonly appreciated — potentially during childhood or young adulthood,” said Lewina Lee, Ph.D., lead author of the study and assistant professor of psychiatry at Boston University School of Medicine.
