Death of Partner Associated With Broken Heart, Literally

— -- A "broken heart" may usually be used as a figure of speech, but a new study found that the death of a partner or spouse may be associated with people developing irregular heartbeats, putting them at risk for stroke or heart attack. The grieving participants in the study were at risk serious health effects from "heartbreak."

The study, published today in the medical journal The Open Heart, looked at whether bereavement over the death of a partner was associated with an irregular heartbeat. The authors from the Aarhus University, in Aarhus, Denmark, looked at 88,612 people who were diagnosed with an irregular heartbeat called atrial fibrillation and compared them to 886,120 healthy people in a control group.

The loss of a partner was associated with person having a 41 percent increased risk of developing atrial fibrillation for the first time compared to those who had not lost a spouse, the study found. This risk occurred regardless of gender or underlying conditions.

The risk peaked about eight to 14 days after the death and subsided after about a year, according to the study.

Surprisingly, people under the age of 60 were twice as likely of developing atrial fibrillation than older people, the study found. Additionally, those who had a sudden loss of a healthy partner where the death was unexpected were 57 percent more likely to develop the irregular heartbeat.

Atrial fibrillation is associated with increased risk of death, stroke and heart failure, according to the study authors. The lifetime risk of developing the condition is between 22 to 29 percent in Western countries, according to the study.

The study authors stress that more research needs to be done and that this does not yet show a partner's death actually causes the irregular heartbeat.

Dr. Sahil Parikh, an interventional cardiologist at University Hospitals Case Medical Center, said the study offers insight on how health can be impacted by relationships. He compared it to other known conditions, such as "broken heart syndrome," in which the heart malfunctions, similar to a heart attack, often after a shocking or tragic event.

"The fact that people get this after a stressful occurrence is not that surprising," Parikh told ABC News of atrial fibrillation.

Parikh pointed the study's findings indicate more study should be done to see how the hormones or adrenaline of grief affect the heart. One theory is that a shocking event can lead to a patient having a "surge of hormones to be prepared for fight for flight response," Parikh said, and that it might have serious effects on the heart function.