Depression Linked to Higher Heart Disease Risk

THURSDAY, March 19 (HealthDay News) -- Depression is associated with a higher risk of developing coronary heart disease, which does not appear to be due to inflammation despite previous studies suggesting a link between inflammation and coronary heart disease, according to the results of a study published in the March 15 issue of the American Journal of Cardiology.

Karina W. Davidson, Ph.D., from Columbia University Medical Center in New York City, and colleagues examined the association between inflammation, depressive symptoms and coronary heart disease in 1,794 Canadian adults.

During 15,514 person-years of observation, the researchers found that there were 152 coronary heart disease events (141 non-fatal, 11 fatal, incidence 9.8 events per 1,000 person-years). Depressed individuals (Center for Epidemiological Studies-Depression scale score of 10 or greater versus 0 to 9) had a higher risk of developing coronary heart disease (hazard ratio 1.59 after adjustment for inflammatory markers). Further adjustment for demographics, clinical factors and medications did not affect this association, the authors report.

"In conclusion, increased inflammation explained only a very small proportion of the association between depression and incident coronary heart disease," Davidson and colleagues write.

Abstract
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