No More Stress Monthly

September, 2007

The No More Stress Monthly is a newsletter that provides featured articles on depression prevention, proper anxiety treatment techniques, reviews of natural depression treatments, interviews with psychologists, and information on both adult depression and teen depression, stress, and anxiety. The No More Stress Monthly is brought to you by Stress-Anxiety-Depression.org.

Effects of Stress

By Dr. Edward F. Group III, DC, ND, DACBN

It has been estimated that 75-90% of all doctors’ visits are due to the effects of stress. Acute stress causes an imbalance in the body's biochemistry. When stress continues for prolonged periods of time, it can lead to the deterioration of both physical and mental health. Stress weakens the immune system and can cause or aggravate certain illnesses and diseases such as cancer, diabetes, and digestive disorders. It can also stimulate the progression of a disease and inhibit our ability to recover from disease. Therefore, the balance of stress and its effects plays a major role in the welfare of our overall health.

The Statistics of Stress

Our ability to manage stress can have a serious impact on our physical and emotional well-being. Consider these sobering facts.

43% of all adults experience adverse health effects due to stress.
Stress is linked to six of the leading causes of death in the United Stated: heart disease, cancer, lung disease, cirrhosis of the liver, accidents, and suicide.
The Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) has estimated that stress costs the American work force over $300 billion annually in reduced productivity, workers' compensation benefits, and absenteeism. They've gone so far as to declare stress a workplace hazard.
As already mentioned, up to 90% of all doctors' visits are for stress-related illnesses, ailments, and complaints.

Stress and Our Health

Stress, in and of itself, is not a bad thing. It is a normal reaction to physical and emotional demands of the world around us. Stress can positively affect our health as it helps to prepare our bodies for impending danger. But its effects become negative when stressful events occur in constant succession with little restin between. The result is a build up of chronic stress-related tension. Learning ways to effectively manage stress helps us control our physical and mental reactions to stressful situations.

Stress disturbs the body's internal chemical balance or equilibrium. This can lead to physical symptoms such as headaches, digestive disorders, high blood pressure, chronic fatigue, chest pain, and sleep disorders. Stress can also aggravate or make us more susceptible to the development of certain diseases, such as heart disease, high blood pressure, stomach ulcers, and cancer.

Stress also affects our mental abilities causing clouded thoughts, difficulty making decisions, poor judgment, depression, and loss of memory. Chronic stress can also lead to the development of more serious emotional disorders, such as anxiety disorders, panic attacks, and clinical depression. Scientists estimate that 50-80% of all mental disorders are caused by or directly related to stress.

Stress and Illness

Researchers have done a number of studies on the characteristics of stress and its effects on our physical and mental health. In one study, scientists looked at the health of medical students during a particularly grueling period of examinations and presentations. In their study, they gave the Hepatitis-B vaccine to three groups of medical students. The first group reported the maximum amount of stress and anxiety over their school work. The second group had the same academic work load, but reported a minimum amount of stress and anxiety as well as a strong social network and support system. The third group fell somewhere in between the other two in regards to stress, anxiety and support levels. The researchers gave each group the hepatitis-B vaccine according to the standard recommended three dose schedule, and then tested each student’s physical reaction and antibody development to the vaccine. They found that those students which had reported the minimum amount of stress and the strongest social support networks developed the largest number of antibodies to the Hepatitis-B vaccine. Whereas the students who felt the most stress and had little social support developed the least amount of antibodies to the vaccine. This one study gives an indication of how the body would react to the actual Hepatitis B virus, if a person under stress should become infected.

The Secondary Effects of Stress

Another harmful side effect of stress is the development of substance abuse problems. Some people use alcohol, tobacco, or drugs to try to relieve or forget about stress and its symptoms. But unfortunately, these substances actually lead to the development of further health problems that will only aggravate overall stress.

Stress also interferes with our abilities to effectively perform daily tasks and activities. It can have serious detrimental effects on our work performance, daily accomplishments, studies, and and intrapersonal relationships. This inefficiency can also lead to disorganization, feelings of inadequacy, anger, dependency, depression, fear of intimacy, isolation, poor decision making, accidents, and even sexual problems.

We all experience stress, but we handle it in different ways. Managing stress is critical to the protection of our overall mental and physical health.