With thanksgiving behind us and finals rapidly approaching I’m
sure we have all felt our fair share of stress these past few weeks. However, we as students do not have the
market cornered on stress, shocking I know.
Just a handful of weeks ago the news broke that John Fox,
coach of the Broncos, would require hospitalization for the replacement of his
aortic valve. This surgery is required
for those who, one way or another, have damaged their aortic valve and have
regurgitation back into their left ventricle.
This is a fairly dangerous condition with results in decreased cardiac
output as some of the blood that has been freshly pumped out of the ventricle
flows back during ventricular diastole.
And what might be one of the major factors that result in
arotic regurgitation? You guessed it, stress. Specifically, the hypertension that results
from chronic stress. Sadly, Fox is only one of many coaches that
have fallen prey to the stress that plagues coaches of many sports. There is a whole list of coaches who have
succumbed to stress and lifestyle related heart disease: ranging from Bo
Schembechler who had a heart attack the day his team played in the rose bowl to
Mike Ditka, who also suffered a heart attack during the season.
So, next time you’re sitting and stressing out about an
upcoming final, remember to take a deep breath and relax. You don’t what that stress to hurt you any
more than it has to.
Niesen J. 2013, November.
A look back: coaches and heart health scares, heart problems, heart
attacks. The Denver Post [Internet]. [cited 2013 Dec 2]. Available From: http://blogs.denverpost.com/broncos/2013/11/03/a-look-back-coaches-and-heart-health-scares-heart-problems-heart-attacks/22932/
Steward B. Siscovick D, Lind B, Gardin J, Gottdiener J,
Smith V, Kitzman D. Otto C. 1997 March. Clinical Factors Associated with
calcification aortic valve disease fn1. Journal of the American College of
Cardiology. 29(3):630-634.
Novaro G. 2010,
August. Aortic valve disease. Cleaveland Clinic [Internet]. [cited 2013 dec 2].
Availible from: http://www.clevelandclinicmeded.com/medicalpubs/diseasemanagement/cardiology/aortic-valve-disease/#references
I agree with you post here Zach, as we learned in physiology short term stress can be good for us. It has been shown that short term stress can enhance the immune response and it can still be beneficial to enter the "fight or flight" response. Long term stress can produce a wide variety of health effects including increasing inflammation, oxidative damage, and even increase cancer progression. So at time that is most stressful to students it is important to remember not to sweat the small stuff.
ReplyDeleteEven though we know that stress can be very detrimental to our health, as seen by many football coaches, why do we still do it? I totally agree that we all need to calm down and relax because it can cause very serious health issues, but just like most things it's a lot easier said than done. I am a collegiate student athlete so my stress levels are consistently at an all time high and even though I know I shouldn't stress, I do it anyways. I really can't help it. Sports put a lot of stress on athletes and coaches just speaking from experience and sometimes it's really hard to control. I read an article that talks about the connection between stress and sports and it mentions that it is caused my physical, psychological, and social factors. I can agree from first hand experience that all these factors contribute to my high levels of stress. Reading your articles about the coaches, did they mention why its so hard for coaches and athletes to deal with stress or any ways to help deal with it?
ReplyDeleteSantomier J. 2001. The sport-stress connection. Theory into Practice. 52:57-63
Sam, one of the articles I found, but didn't cite, made the argument that coaches are under large amounts of stress because they work 100+ hours per week. I can't actually attest to this, and the article wasn't scholarly, but it does offer one potential reason for why many of these coaches are suffering from diseases of chronic stress.
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