There is now a large body of scientific evidence demonstrating that several psychiatric disorders are associated with a potent risk for the development of cardiovascular disease (CVD). Most of these studies come from large cohort studies that have both cross-sectional and prospective designs. The mechanisms implicated include health behaviors, autonomic dysregulation, inflammation, and others. There are also a growing number of studies showing that sleep disorders, including insomnia, short and long sleep duration, and obstructive sleep apnea (OSA), which are often comorbid with major depression and posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD), also carry an increased risk for CVD. A recent review of PTSD and CVD identified several research gaps in our understanding of the mechanisms for increased CVD and emphasized the need to understand the connections at the brain circuit level among PTSD-related hyperarousal, inflammation, and cardiovascular function [1]. However, there are pragmatic limits to coupling functional imaging with cardiovascular measurements and there remains a need for pragmatic methods to advance the field.
Language: en
LA - en SN - 0161-8105 UR - http://dx.doi.org/10.1093/sleep/zsad082 ID - ref1 ER -