Women and Work Related Illness

Women with demanding jobs 40% more likely to have heart attack, stroke.
The CBS Evening News (11/14, story 11, 0:20, Mitchell) reported, "Findings of the longest major study on stress in women are in this evening. The 10-year study found women with demanding jobs were 40% more likely to have a heart attack or stroke as women with less stressful jobs."
The AP (11/14) reported that the study presented at the American Heart Association conference on Nov. 14 followed "17,415 participants in the Women's Health Study" for 10 years. The investigators then discovered that "women with demanding jobs and little control over how to do them were nearly twice as likely to have suffered a heart attack as women with less demanding jobs and more control."
"Women with high-stress jobs face about 88 percent more risk of a heart attack than if they had low workplace strain," Bloomberg News (11/14, Lopatto) reported. The study authors "defined the stressful positions as those with demanding tasks and little authority or creativity," Bloomberg News noted.
CNN /Health.com (11/14, Harding) quoted researcher Peter Kaufmann, PhD, of the National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute, as saying, "This new data is among the most important to emerge in recent years concerning the relationship between job strain and cardiovascular health." Kaufmann, who is not involved with the study, added that the "finding 'emphasize that progress is needed urgently in this arena.'"