Cardiac health: relationships among hostility, spirituality, and health risk.

This study examined hostility, spirituality, and indices of health risk among 100 young, primarily males of Hispanic background. Over half of the subjects were prehypertensive or hypertensive; one third had at least 2 objective risk factors for cardiac disease; and younger participants had lower spirituality scores and higher cynical distrust scores. Body mass index, spirituality, and glucose accounted for 29% of variance in systolic blood pressure; body mass index and age accounted for 39% of variance in diastolic blood pressure. The tools to assess cardiac risk (blood pressure, history, capillary blood screening, body mass index) are all "low tech" and low cost but used together are powerful in identifying risk populations.