title: Phobic anxiety symptom scores and incidence of type 2 diabetes in US men and women.
abstract: BACKGROUND
  Emotional stress may be a risk factor for type 2 diabetes (T2D), but the relation between phobic anxiety symptoms and risk of T2D is uncertain.
  
  
  OBJECTIVE
  To evaluate prospectively the association between phobic anxiety symptoms and incident T2D in three cohorts of US men and women.
  
  
  METHODS
  We followed 30,791 men in the Health Professional's Follow-Up Study (HPFS) (1988-2008), 68,904 women in the Nurses' Health Study (NHS) (1988-2008), and 79,960 women in the Nurses' Health Study II (NHS II) (1993-2011). Phobic anxiety symptom scores, as measured by the Crown-Crisp index (CCI), calculated from 8 questions, were administered at baseline and updated in 2004 for NHS, in 2005 for NHS II, and in 2000 for HPFS. Incident T2D was confirmed by a validated supplementary questionnaire. We used Cox proportional hazards analysis to evaluate associations with incident T2D.
  
  
  RESULTS
  During 3,099,651 person-years of follow-up, we documented 12,831 incident T2D cases. In multivariate Cox proportional-hazards models with adjustment for major lifestyle and dietary risk factors, the hazard ratios (HRs) of T2D across categories of increasing levels of CCI (scores=2 to <3, 3 to <4, 4 to <6, ⩾6), compared with a score of <2, were increased significantly by 6%, 10%, 10% and 13% (Ptrend=0.001) for NHS; and by 19%, 11%, 21%, and 29% (Ptrend<0.0001) for NHS II. Each score increment in CCI was associated with 2% higher risk of T2D in NHS (HRs, 1.02, 95% confidence intervals: 1.01-1.03) and 4% higher risk of T2D in NHS II (HRs, 1.04, 95% confidence intervals: 1.02-1.05). Further adjustment for depression did not change the results. In HPFS, the association between CCI and T2D was not significant after adjusting for lifestyle variables.
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  Our results suggest that higher phobic anxiety symptoms are associated with an increased risk of T2D in women.
authors.affiliation: Department of Nutrition, Harvard School of Public Health, Boston, MA, United States. Electronic address: mfarvid@hsph.harvard.edu.
authors.forename: Maryam S
authors.initials: MS
authors.lastname: Farvid
authors.affiliation: Department of Nutrition, Harvard School of Public Health, Boston, MA, United States; Channing Division of Network Medicine, Department of Medicine, Brigham and Women's Hospital and Harvard Medical School, Boston, MA, United States.
authors.forename: Lu
authors.initials: L
authors.lastname: Qi
authors.affiliation: Department of Nutrition, Harvard School of Public Health, Boston, MA, United States; Department of Epidemiology, Harvard School of Public Health, Boston, MA, United States; Channing Division of Network Medicine, Department of Medicine, Brigham and Women's Hospital and Harvard Medical School, Boston, MA, United States.
authors.forename: Frank B
authors.initials: FB
authors.lastname: Hu
authors.affiliation: Department of Social and Behavioral Sciences, Harvard School of Public Health, Boston, MA, United States.
authors.forename: Ichiro
authors.initials: I
authors.lastname: Kawachi
authors.affiliation: Department of Epidemiology, Harvard School of Public Health, Boston, MA, United States; Channing Division of Network Medicine, Department of Medicine, Brigham and Women's Hospital and Harvard Medical School, Boston, MA, United States; Department of Psychiatry, Brigham and Women's Hospital and Harvard Medical School, Boston, MA, United States.
authors.forename: Olivia I
authors.initials: OI
authors.lastname: Okereke
authors.affiliation: Department of Social and Behavioral Sciences, Harvard School of Public Health, Boston, MA, United States.
authors.forename: Laura D
authors.initials: LD
authors.lastname: Kubzansky
authors.affiliation: Department of Nutrition, Harvard School of Public Health, Boston, MA, United States; Department of Epidemiology, Harvard School of Public Health, Boston, MA, United States; Channing Division of Network Medicine, Department of Medicine, Brigham and Women's Hospital and Harvard Medical School, Boston, MA, United States.
authors.forename: Walter C
authors.initials: WC
authors.lastname: Willett
mesh_terms: D000328:Adult; D000368:Aged; D003924:Diabetes Mellitus, Type 2 / Q000150:complications / Q000453:epidemiology*; D005260:Female; D005500:Follow-Up Studies; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged; D010698:Phobic Disorders / Q000150:complications / Q000453:epidemiology*; D011446:Prospective Studies; D012307:Risk Factors; D012720:Severity of Illness Index; D014481:United States; D055815:Young Adult
keywords: Phobic anxiety; Type 2 diabetes