Most of us know what it feels
like to be lonesome and heartbroken — that unbearable
ache, the sense of isolation, the despair. But it may
surprise you to learn that the descriptor "broken
heart" isn't just a quaint metaphor; in fact, it's
a quite literal description of the toll that loneliness
can take on a human being.
DEATH
BY LONELINESS
At the meeting of the American Heart Association in
May, Dr Eric Loucks, of the Harvard School of Public
Health, presented findings that showed a link between
loneliness in men and risk factors for heart disease.
With his team, Dr Loucks studied 3,267 American men
and women with an average age of 62, who were taking
part in the Framingham Heart Study — a longitudinal
study of the inhabitants of Framingham, MA, which was
begun in 1948 to identify the common factors or characteristics
that contribute to cardiovascular disease.
Between 1998 and 2001 patients
underwent physical exams, including blood tests, and
were asked about their marital status, how many people
they felt they could confide in and if they took part
in community or religious activities.
"We found that socially isolated
men had higher levels of the risk factor for heart disease
called interleukin-6," explains Dr Loucks in a
phone interview. The protein interleukin-6 (IL-6) is
an inflammatory marker and strong predictor of heart
disease. Dr Loucks, who hails from Victoria, BC, explains
that he was inspired to conduct the research after previous
studies had shown higher mortality and heart disease
in socially isolated men and women. "Typically,
socially isolated men have an over two-fold higher risk
of mortality compared to socially connected men,"
he says.
NOT
IN WOMEN
Interestingly, Dr Loucks did not find similarly elevated
levels of interleukin-6 in socially isolated women.
"It's likely due to the fact that men and women
experience social relationships differently as a whole,"
he postulates. "In this study, we mostly counted
the number of relationships that people had. We didn't
ask much about the quality of those relationships, and
we feel that future studies should get into asking more
about the quality of those relationships."
As to exactly how isolation can
contribute to elevated levels of interleukin-6, Dr Loucks
has some ideas. "Socially isolated people are more
likely to smoke and they're also less likely to be physically
active," he says. These factors would have a definite
influence on interleukin-6 concentrations. "Socially
isolated people are also more likely to be depressed
and suffer from anxiety," he adds, "and stress
— even short-term stress — has been shown
to increase interleukin-6 concentrations."
REACHING
OUT
For Dr Charmaine Enns, a former GP who is now a medical
health officer with the Vancouver Island Health Authority,
Dr Loucks's study just adds more credence to the notion
that social isolation is linked to poor health outcomes.
"Quality of life and health
status can all be negatively impacted by other determinants,
like social isolation, or depression, or stress,"
says Dr Enns, adding that doctors need to embrace the
idea of the patient in a holistic manner. GPs should
ensure that they inquire about their patients' lifestyles,
she notes, and encourage them to get involved in their
community.
"We can't fix the world's
problems, but even by asking people about it, it will
often trigger a reaction like, 'You're right, I've kind
of blocked everybody out,'" she says.
As evidence mounts of the
link between the psychological and the physical, doctors
may need to rethink the way they treat their patients.
As Dr Enns says: "We need to stay very aware, as
we care for our patients, that they aren't just a physical
body. There's a spirit and there's a soul and there's
a body. Anything that happens in any one of those areas
is also going to affect the rest of what makes us who
we are."
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