NEW YORK (Reuters Health) - Men and women who defy traditional societal roles may suffer health consequences such as heart disease, researchers reported here Wednesday at the American Heart Association's Asia Pacific Scientific Forum in Honolulu, Hawaii.

"Nontraditional roles may not be healthy," lead author Dr. Elaine D. Eaker, head of Eaker Epidemiology Enterprises in Chili, Wisconsin, told Reuters Health.

Eaker and colleagues at the Framingham Offspring Study, a multi-generation study based in Framingham, Massachusetts, followed patterns of heart disease and death among nearly 3,700 participants for 10 years in the 1980s. The researchers examined whether factors such as job-related stress has an impact on heart disease and overall mortality.

The investigators did not find that high amounts of job stress, characterized as having high demands with little autonomy, was associated with an increased risk of heart disease. However, they did find that women who were in positions of high authority with high job demands suffered higher rates of heart disease than other women, although their male counterparts did not.

The researchers took into account factors such as smoking, age and cholesterol, as well as anxiety, stress and household responsibilities.

"We couldn't find anything to account for this relationship," Eaker said. "We know things related to disease and death have psychological or social attributes. This could be one."

Similarly, men who dubbed themselves primarily as "househusbands"--about 10% of participants--had an 82% higher 10-year death rate than men who worked outside the home. Factors such as age, blood pressure, weight, smoking, cholesterol levels and diabetes were also taken into account. However, other factors that might have caused the men to stay at home were not explored.

Taking these two contradictory findings into account, Eaker and colleagues conclude that men and women who rebuffed societal roles might have encountered extra stress that resulted in the higher heart disease and death rates.

"It is upsetting," Eaker conceded. "These men and women were on the cutting edge of social conditions. The hope is that we're through that transition. I think rather than being judgmental, we have to value people in the roles they're in and not put social judgments on people."

Reference Source 89

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