Heart-Rending Situation

American Fitness, Jan, 1999

A Stanford University School of Medicine study involving 81 women ages 50 to 85 living in the San Francisco area shows daughters who serve as the primary caregivers for an ailing parent display more cardiovascular stress than wives caring for their ailing husbands. "It may be more of an imposition for a younger person who hasn't planned or bargained for it, as opposed to a wife who has chosen to marry someone and may be more accepting of the responsibility," according to Abby King, assistant professor at the Stanford Center for Research in Disease Prevention.

However, wives showed more stress than daughters when merely talking about the unpleasant side of taking care of their husbands. Conversations in a laboratory setting about the negative aspects of caregiving elevated blood pressure in wives to a greater degree than it did daughters.