Happily married women may face lower risk of heart disease, stroke.


April 3, 2004 -- A happy marriage may reduce a woman¹s risk of developing cardiovascular disease or stroke, while remaining in an unhappy marriage or being divorced may increase a woman¹s risk, according to a study that will be presented at the American Psychosomatic Society meeting in Orlando. For the study, researchers at the University of Pittsburgh followed 422 premenopausal women for 12 years to analyze the effects marital status had on their health later in life. According to the results, unhappily married or divorced women were more than twice as likely to develop heart disease or stroke after menopause when compared with happily married women. The researchers also found that unhappily married women were more likely than single women to develop heart disease or stroke, a finding that led the researchers to note that while a "good marriage is therapeutic, a bad one may be worse than none at all."

(Elias, USA Today, 3/3/04).

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