Depression Raises Midlife Women’s Stroke Risk

Women in their 40s and 50s have a very low risk of stroke, but the risk doubles if they are depressed, a new study finds. The study included 10,547 women who had no history of stroke. Their ages ranged between 47 and 52 when the study began. Researchers had them fill out health surveys every 3 years for the next 12 years. In that time, 177 women had strokes. The stroke rate among women with depression was 2.4 times as high as for women without depression. Depressed women also were more likely to have other health factors, such as smoking, that increased their risk of stroke. After researchers accounted for those factors, depression alone almost doubled the women’s risk of stroke. Overall, about 1.5% of the women had strokes during the study. The journal Stroke published the study. HealthDay News wrote about it May 16.