Health Risks from Stress-Heart Disease, Hypertension, Cancer, and Diabetes

Many health risks are associated with stress and health experts believe that extended stressful situations are the cause many health related issues. Michael Olpin and Margie Hesson report that stressors contribute to a variety of illnesses and 70% to 80% of all doctors visits are due to stress-related events (2007). The main health issues associated with stress are heart disease, hypertension, cancer, and diabetes.

There are 180,000 deaths a year that can be attributed to stress on an individual's heart (Cartwright & Cooper, 1997). Over 70 million work days lost a year from heart disease related from stressors (Cartwright & Cooper, 1997). This would indicate that high levels of stress are bad for a person's heart over both the short- and long-term. Heart issues are closely related to smoking and obesity and the triple threat of the three are damaging for...
[ View Full Essay]