Prevent Disease.com - Panic Attacks Common Among Older Women



		Panic Attacks Common Among Older Women Nearly 18% of women who've passed menopause experience panic attacks and their occurrence seems to be tied to stressful life events and coexisting medical problems, new research suggests. Although panic attacks are known to affect women more often than men, the rate and predictors of this psychiatric problem after menopause are unclear. To investigate, Dr. Jordan W. Smoller, from Massachusetts General Hospital in Boston, and colleagues analyzed data from 3369 older women. Specifically, the subjects were surveyed regarding the occurrence of panic attacks in the previous 6 months. The researchers' findings are published in the Archives of Internal Medicine. About 10 percent of women reported full-blown attacks and 8 percent reported less severe attacks, the investigators note. The risk for both types of panic attack increased as the number of stressful life events in the past year rose. Compared with no stressful events, five or more events raised the risk of full-blown attacks by about sevenfold and less severe attacks by about threefold. The presence of coexisting diseases increased the risk of panic attacks. For full-blown attacks, the conditions that conferred the highest risk were certain migraines, depression, chronic lung disease, and chest pain. For less severe attacks, the diseases with the greatest risk included migraine, chest pain, heart disease, and asthma. Treatment with hormone-replacement therapy did not appear to be a risk factor for either type of panic attack, the researchers point out. The authors found that panic attacks were often tied to functional impairment. Full-blown panic attacks, and to a lesser extent limited-symptom attacks, increased the likelihood of impaired social functioning and role limitations. "To our knowledge, this study is the largest survey of the prevalence and correlates of panic attacks in postmenopausal women," the investigators note. "Future studies of this sample will further characterize the association of panic attacks with cardiac and other health outcomes," they add. SOURCE: Archives of Internal Medicine, September 22, 2003. Reference Source 89 For more information on how to prevent other diseases, use PreventDisease.com's "Quick Prevention Resources".