R. Murali Krishna, M.D. President

Can your mind affect your heart?
Picture this: You've come home from a hair-pulling, one-crisis-after-another day filled with deadlines, demands and stress. You walk into the house, hug your spouse, change into your most comfortable sweats and plop down in your easy chair to relax. As your day decelerates, your blood pressure drops and your heart rate slows.

Or picture this: You've fallen deeply in love, and you're just about to meet the love of your life for dinner. You spot him across the restaurant, and the two of you begin to walk towards each other. With each step the anticipation and thrill you feel escalates, and your heart rate elevates right along with it.

Each scenario above describes a situation in which thoughts affect the heart. We understand and accept that love, anger, fear and other emotions, particularly strongly felt emotions, affect the heart on a short-term basis. What's less understood is that emotions and thoughts can have long-term effects on the health of the heart, too.

Fortunately, pioneering medical researchers have been making the picture clear.

At Duke University, researchers studied 107 patients with impaired blood flow to the heart, a condition which worsens the outlook for heart patients. The patients were divided into three groups. One group spent four months learning about stress management; another group undertook a four-month exercise program; and the third group received traditional heart care from their personal physicians.

During the next three years, just three of the people in the stress management group had experienced a heart attack or required a heart bypass or angioplasty. But seven of the exercise group and 12 of the traditional care group experienced a heart attack or needed surgery. The conclusion: Reducing the stress in life can reduce the risk of heart problems.

There's more. A study conducted by Johns Hopkins of 2,000 people in Baltimore, showed that people with depression have 4 ½ times higher risk of heart attack than people who are not depressed. Another study showed that after a first heart attack, "Type D" people – people who tend to become more easily distressed than others – had a 300 percent greater risk of having a second heart attack. And still another study, this one in 1995 of 232 patients at Dartmouth Medical School who had undergone elective heart surgery found the "very religious" were three times more likely to recover than those who were not.

The evidence is becoming more and more clear: What you think and feel can affect the health of your heart. What can you do to make sure your thoughts – and heart – are healthy?

First, learn to recognize and deal with stress. Stress is part of all our lives, and the goal is to deal with it in a healthy manner. If your job is causing you stress in an uncomfortable way, you may need to change certain aspects of the job, change your attitude about the job or perhaps even jobs altogether. Life is full of choices, and you can decide to be a victim or master of them.

Second, find inner serenity and tranquility. Different people have different ways of centering themselves in a calm place – meditation, prayer, recreation, gardening, exercise, solitude. Find what works for you and then make sure you find the time to pursue it.

Third, find spiritual fulfillment. If that involves belief in a higher power, so much the better, since research indicates that belief itself brings health benefits such as a stronger immune system and a heightened ability to cope with pain and distress.

Fourth, seek healthy relationships. We all need people with whom to share our hopes and dreams, people who will support us, people who care about our happiness and our place in the world. Those relationships have a tremendous calming effect on us, both physically and mentally.

Fifth, look for opportunities to serve others. Studies show that people who are happiest are more often those involved in helping others in some form or fashion.

Sixth, view the world with a sense of humor. Where there's humor, there's laughter, and laughter relaxes muscles, lowers blood pressure and reduces levels of hormones that create stress and suppress immunity.

Finally, learn to enjoy the moment. All of us have hopes and dreams, plans and schedules. We have bills, deadlines and commitments looming in front of us. It's good to anticipate what is to come, but concentrating too much on what is to come doesn't leave room for experiencing what's good about the present. Sometimes, it's good simply to enjoy the now - the pleasurable moments with family and friends, the bright new life of spring, the sun warming us on a walk.

None of this is to say that you can prevent heart disease or fix an ailing heart simply by thinking happy thoughts, thinking of others or achieving spiritual fulfillment. We cannot ignore the fact that our minds reside inside complex biological machines that sometimes move unalterably down the path toward heart problems or other illnesses.

However, the understandings we are gaining of the way in which the mind can affect the heart suggests there is much to be gained by going beyond the bounds of traditional medicine. For our health, it may be important that we minister not just to our physical state, but to our mental and emotional needs as well.

R. Murali Krishna, M.D., is president and COO of INTEGRIS Mental Health Inc., one of the state's largest providers of mental health services. He is also president of the James L. Hall Jr. Center for Mind, Body and Spirit. He has maintained a private psychiatry practice for more than 25 years and is a clinical professor of psychiatry at University of Oklahoma Health Sciences Center.