Stressful life-events exposure is associated with 17-year mortality, but it is health-related events that prove predictive.
OBJECTIVE
Despite the widely-held view that psychological stress is a major cause of poor health, few studies have examined the relationship between stressful life-events exposure and death. The present analyses examined the association between overall life-events stress load, health-related and health-unrelated stress, and subsequent all-cause mortality.


METHODS
This study employed a prospective longitudinal design incorporating time-varying covariates.


METHODS
Participants were 968 Scottish men and women who were 56 years old. Stressful life-events experience for the preceding 2 years was assessed at baseline, 8-9 years and 12-13 years later. Mortality was tracked for the subsequent 17 years during which time 266 participants had died. Cox's regression models with time-varying covariates were applied. We adjusted for sex, occupational status, smoking, BMI, and systolic blood pressure.


RESULTS
Overall life-events numbers and their impact scores at the time of exposure and the time of assessment were associated with 17-year mortality. Health-related event numbers and impact scores were strongly predictive of mortality. This was not the case for health-unrelated events.


CONCLUSIONS
The frequency of life-events and the stress load they imposed were associated with all-cause mortality. However, it was the experience and impact of health-related, not health-unrelated, events that proved predictive. This reinforces the need to disaggregate these two classes of exposures in studies of stress and health outcomes.
Phillips
Anna C
AC
School of Sport and Exercise Sciences, University of Birmingham, Birmingham, UK.
Der
Geoff
G
Carroll
Douglas
D
D000368:Aged; D001794:Blood Pressure; D015992:Body Mass Index; D002318:Cardiovascular Diseases / Q000401:mortality / Q000523:psychology; D002423:Cause of Death; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D008016:Life Change Events; D008137:Longitudinal Studies; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged; D009026:Mortality; D009369:Neoplasms / Q000401:mortality / Q000523:psychology; D011446:Prospective Studies; D012140:Respiratory Tract Diseases / Q000401:mortality / Q000523:psychology; D012803:Sick Role; D012907:Smoking / Q000401:mortality; D006113:United Kingdom