[Psychological comorbidity in patients with alarming chest pain symptoms]

About 1/3 of patients with chest pain undergoing coronary arteriography (CA) have no coronary artery disease (CAD). Individuals with non-CAD chest pain may be younger and more likely to be female; they may express higher degrees of neuroticism. Are those features stable enough to justifi; exclusion from CA if present? To investigate this issue, data on psychodiagnostic parameters (depression, anxiety, somatic complaints) were obtained in patients before this were referred to CA. Inclusion criteria were a chief complaint of chest pain with episodes of angina-like pain at rest, suspicious enough to warrant cardiac catherisation; and no prior history of CAD or other organic heart disease. The sample consisted of 77 patients, recruited from 89 eligible patients. 12 patients were excluded because CA findings were missing for multiple reasons. CA was conducted by Judkins technique. Patients were labeled as CAD (-) if no stenosis were detectable. In 50 (65%) of cases CA findings were positive and in 27 (35%) findings were negative. CAD+ were significantly older (p < 0.05); the superiority in both groups were male. Prevalence of emotional disorders was markedly more pronounced in both groups in comparison to the normal population and to a group of male myocardial infarction survivors. However, those features did not discriminate between the groups. Long acting chest pain was predictive for high degrees of emotional disability (relative risk 5.33; 95% Kl 1.6-61.6; p < 0.012). Chest pain at rest is a major source of anxiety, depression and subsequent somatic preoccupation despite its ischaemic or functional origin. It leads to clinically relevant adjustment disorders in a significant proportion of chest pain patients and triggers emotional disstress. These factors may thus have less impact on risk stratification than expected.