St. Joseph's Healthcare System

Presenting Elliot Brown, MD, FACC, Associate Clinical Professor of Medicine, St. Joseph's Healthcare System, to discuss the link between our minds (the human psyche) and our health.

Heart Disease is the 1,2,3,4 and 5 killer of all males combined. Incidents of heart disease and death peaked in the 1960s. We started having steep slopes of improvement up until the end of the last millennium. People suffer from intellectual emotional mismatch, these people come to see Dr. Brown after open heart bypass surgery with a pack of cigarettes in their front pocket or continue in their destructive health even after undergoing traumatic heart injuring events. We have a stress response internally that makes us wired to survive for acute stress when a predator chases us, heart rate and blood pressure go up, blood sugar rises as well to give us energy, triglycerides come into the blood stream to give us energy from fat, allergy reactions diminish and inflammatory and blood clotting increase, all combining to allow us to survive an altercation. Humans today suffer chronic stress through financial obligations, mortgages, putting children through school etc. This leads to increased blood clotting which in turn leads to coronary thrombosis, increased inflammation of high c reactive protein levels, high blood sugar (diabetes), high fats (hyperlipidemia), high blood pressure (hypertension), so when our body gets turned on in the central nervous system it leads to all of these factors. Chronic stress and depression can have a large impact on cardiac risk factors. Interpret your environment in a less stressful way, yoga, deep breathing and other relaxation techniques are key to your mental and physical health.