Gender differences in psychological impairment after a coronary incident

The goal of this study was to determine in 231 coronary patients (109 men, 122 women) which variables of psychological impairment were most discrimina ting between the sexes at 5 weeks, 4 months, and 18 months after a coronary incident, and whether using absolute scores or clinical levels of psycholo gical impairment might have an impact on the results. Hierarchical logistic regression analyses were performed both for absolute scores and clinical l evels. Using absolute scores, women seemed more impaired than men at every measure ment. However, comparing clinical levels of psychological impairment yielde d a more differentiated picture. While more women than men reached clinical levels on some variables of psychological impairment (vital exhaustion, so cial inhibition, and anxiety), more men than women displayed clinical level s on other variables (agoraphobia, depression, and hostility). In contrast to previous research, women did not show consistently higher levels of psyc hological impairment than men after a coronary incident. It should be noted , however, that these previous studies did not make use of gender-specific norms to assess psychological impairment. (C) 2000 Elsevier Science Ltd. Al l rights reserved.