Dr Nighat reveals heart attacks symptoms in women

We use your sign-up to provide content in ways you’ve consented to and to improve our understanding of you. This may include adverts from us and 3rd parties based on our understanding. You can unsubscribe at any time. More info

The study was conducted by the University of Bristol and published in the British Journal of Psychiatry Open and investigated the impact of antidepressants on long-term health. In common with all medications, antidepressants can have side effects.

Known as SSRIs and SNRIs, these side effects can include:
• Feeling agitated
• Feeling and being sick
• Indigestion
• Diarrhoea
• Loss of appetite
• Dizziness
• Insomnia
• Headaches
• Loss of libido.

However, this is the first study to establish a link between the most common form of antidepressant – SSRIs – and heart attacks. In order to come to their conclusion, the University analysed data from 220,121 people from the UK Biobank.

These people were between the ages of 40 and 69 and just over half of them were women; the results from the data made for significant reading.

Overall, people who took SSRIs over a long period of time were 34 percent more likely to have an increased risk of heart disease or cardiovascular death and were 73 percent more likely to die from any cause.

As to the impact of other antidepressants such as SNRIs and TCAs, the risk of a heart attack or death from any other cause was around double, meaning people were twice as likely to experience these phenomena as those who didn’t take these medications.

Writing in the journal, the researchers said: “Antidepressants, and especially SSRIs, may have a good safety profile in the short term, but are associated with adverse outcomes in the long term.

“This is important because most of the substantial increase in prescribing in the past 20 or more years is in long-term repeat prescribing.”

Alongside increasing the risk of a heart attack, the authors also found that SSRIs increased the risk of developing both high blood pressure – also known as hypertension – and diabetes.

SSRIs increased the risk of high blood pressure by 23 percent and diabetes by around 32 percent. However, with regard to these two conditions, it was noted that more research was needed.

While SSRIs can increase the risk of a fatal heart attack, high blood pressure, and diabetes, the researchers said there was no need for people to stop their medication.

Lead author Doctor Narinder Bansal said: “While we have taken into account a wide range of pre-existing risk factors for cardiovascular disease, including those that are linked to depression such as excess weight, smoking, and low physical activity, it is difficult to fully control for the effects of depression in this kind of study, partly because there is considerable variability in the recording of depression severity in primary care.”

Doctor Bansal added patients should speak to their GP if they were concerned and added: “This is important because many people taking antidepressants such as mirtazapine, venlafaxine, duloxetine and trazodone may have a more severe depression. This makes it difficult to fully separate the effects of the depression from the effects of medication.

“Further research is needed to assess whether the associations we have seen are genuinely due to the drugs, and if so, why this might be. Meanwhile, our message for clinicians is that prescribing of antidepressants in the long term may not be harm-free.”

Furthermore, she called for “proactive cardiovascular monitoring” of patients taking antidepressants as they are “associated with higher risks”. Meanwhile, Professor Glyn Lewis from University College London said that people should not be “alarmed or worried” and said they should not stop taking their medication.

Professor Lewis added: “There is a lot of evidence, from other research, that depression is associated with increased cardiovascular disease.Clearly, there’s behavioural things (associated with depression), where people might not look after themselves as well, and there may also be hormonal changes and metabolic changes which might increase risk of physical illnesses in the longer term.”

On the nature of the research, they cautioned that although the data was strong, that more significant trials were needed to establish the risk: “Without a (randomised controlled trial), it’s always going to be really, really difficult to make any inference about whether it’s antidepressants or the depression leading to these kinds of associations.

“These results on their own should not lead to people thinking they should stop their antidepressants. This kind of study isn’t robust enough to be able to make that kind of conclusion.”

Fellow professor David Osborn reflected his colleagues’ views on the data writing: “We have known that depression and anxiety are associated with raised rates of cardiovascular disease for many years. This explains the findings in this interesting paper but there is no evidence here of a causal role for antidepressants. Proving causation would require more elaborate research methods.

“However, the paper highlights that people with depression should receive holistic treatment including their physical health.”

Source: Read Full Article