Longitudinal analysis of the relation between moderate long-term stress and health

The main goal of the present work was to longitudinally examine consequences of long-term moderately elevated levels of stress for various health outcomes. To address this issue, data covering 10 years was used from the ongoing Swedish population-based prospective Betula Study. Based on the ratings on a validated self-reported stress scale, matched subsamples between 40 and 65 years of age were divided into a high (n = 13 7) and low (n = 211) stress group. The reported incidence of cardiovascular, diabetes, psychiatric, tumour and musculoskeletal diseases was assessed S and 10 years after baseline (baseline = 1993-1995) without contaminating effects of past health history. The incidence of diseases S years after baseline assessment showed no differences between the groups. After 10 years, there was a significantly higher incidence of psychiatric diseases, mainly depression in the high-stress group as well as a significant effect for tumours, although the number of cases was low. Although moderately elevated stress level may have a possible impact on psychiatric diseases especially depression and some tumours, it seems that prolonged moderate stress does not appear to be harmful to other stress-related diseases. Copyright (c) 2007 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.