Hair Folicles May Be the Key to Preventing Heart Disease

It isn't the hair follicle alone that can be the key to reducing the risk of heart disease, but the hormone found in it may be the key. The hormone is cortisol and it is a stress hormone. This is the first solid evidence that stress actually does cause heart attacks. When the cortisol level is high in the hair follicle, the stress level is high. According to WebMD heart disease news, this brings a direct correlation between chronic stress and a higher chance that you will have a heart attack.

Although there have been other tests done for cortisol in blood, urine and saliva, those are very short term determinants for stress levels. In other words, it only gives results based on what is going on in the body at the moment where stress is concerned. That isn't the case with the hair follicle tests. That is because the hair keeps the cortisol in tact and can give longer term results as to whether stress is high on a regular basis or if it only happens occasionally. The reason that you can see the longer term results is because as the hair grows the cortisol results change with the growth. Each centimeter of hair can be checked for stress levels. Hair grows at an approximate rate of a centimeter monthly. So for every centimeter of hair, it can be determined how high your stress levels rose for each month.

This is an amazing breakthrough that could help a great deal in determining how high the risk factor is for an individual for a heart attack. If doctors were able to put this testing into their offices for check-ups, that would mean the ability to reduce the risk for the patient. The patient could be put on medication if necessary to help reduce stress and could be taught how to cut back on stress in order to lower the risk for heart disease.

The study mentioned in WebMD's article about this subject suggest that the men who tested high in cortisol hair follicles were all men who had heart attacks. Men who had been put in the hospital for other reasons didn't have the same high level as those who had heart attacks. Other factors were present as well. For instance, the men who had heart attacks also had lower levels of good cholesterol (lipoprotein) in their system. This is an amazing breakthrough that could help millions of people realize that they are at high risk for heart disease and change their habits so that they can lower these risks.

Heart attacks can kill. This breakthrough can help stop the madness of heart disease or at least lower the number of people who get it. Knowledge is always the key to prevention where health is concerned. The only way you can prevent heart disease and other illnesses is to know your risks for it and then lowering the risk so that you have a far less chance of getting it. If you go to your doctors office and they yank a strand of hair from your head, don't be surprised. That could well be what is coming to the future of healthcare.