US Experts Probe Link Between Emotions and Health

Some of the early research on stress and the body's hormonal response, especially cortisol, appeared in publications by the New York Academy of Medicine in 1964. Stress plays a role in our susceptibility to infection, our likelihood of developing coronary artery disease, and a host of other diseases. Some of the problems doing research in diseases has been how to account for the impact of stress. Over the years, the use of a placebo in clinical trials has been insisted upon by the FDA, believing, wrongly, that in a correctly sampled population, the effects of stress should even out between the active and control groups. However, when the differences between active drug/device and placebo are small, or the placebo effect is as much as 40%, consideration should be given to improving our understanding of stress. Resuming and valuing stress & illness research is needed.