Medical diagnosis of type A behavior.
The objective of this investigation was to develop a medically oriented examination (including a search for physical signs in addition to elicitation of symptoms) for the accurate diagnosis of type A and type B behaviors. Comprising the study were 99 post-myocardial infarction patients, 15 clinically well persons in whom clinical coronary heart disease subsequently developed, and 23 healthy type B subjects. All participants were subjected to a videotaped clinical examination during which, in addition to eliciting responses to questions, 14 possible physical or psychomotor signs (many of which are newly discovered) of type A behavior were also observed. Each physical sign and symptom was given an arbitrarily weighted score (according to its observed frequency of occurrence in previously studied and authenticated type A behavior). These total scores were then statistically analyzed to obtain a critical "diagnostic score" for the presence of type A behavior. The medically oriented videotaped clinical examination detected the presence of type A behavior in 97 of 99 (98%) successively examined postinfarction patients and in 14 of 15 (93%) subjects who were clinically well at the time of their videotaped clinical examination but who subsequently had clinical coronary heart disease. Conversely type A behavior was diagnosed by videotaped clinical examination in only 1 of 23 (4%) healthy men who previously had been found to exhibit type B behavior by prior diagnostic procedures.
Friedman
M
M
Meyer Friedman Institute, Mount Zion Medical Center, UCSF 94120.
Ghandour
G
G
D000368:Aged; D003327:Coronary Disease / Q000175:diagnosis* / Q000453:epidemiology / Q000523:psychology; D005149:Facial Expression; D006791:Hostility; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged; D015995:Prevalence; D011379:Prognosis; D011596:Psychomotor Disorders / Q000175:diagnosis / Q000453:epidemiology / Q000523:psychology; D012680:Sensitivity and Specificity; D014434:Type A Personality; D014743:Videotape Recording