Heart disease is often linked to high cholesterol, obesity, or lack of exercise. However, there is mounting evidence that suggests that mental health plays a crucial role in cardiovascular well-being. Stress, anxiety, and depression can silently strain the heart, increasing the risk of serious complications.

A recent study, published in Nature Human Behaviour, showed that loneliness has a significant impact on proteins present in a person's blood. For the study, researchers used data from more than 42,000 participants to explore whether the 9.3% who reported social isolation and 6.4% who reported loneliness had different levels of proteins in their blood compared with those who did not. The researchers then studied data that tracked the health of participants over an average 14-year period.

"We found around 90% of these proteins are linked to the risk of mortality," Dr Chun Shen, Fudan University in China, who is also the lead researcher said. "In addition, about 50% of the proteins were linked to cardiovascular disease, type 2 diabetes and stroke," he added.

Dr Shrey Kumar Srivastav, senior consultant at Sharda Hospital, said that subtle symptoms of heart disease, such as fatigue, shortness of breath, swelling in the lower legs, dizziness, and jaw pain, are often overlooked or attributed to stress and ageing. "Women, in particular, may experience atypical signs like extreme fatigue, indigestion, or upper abdominal pain instead of classic chest pain, leading to delayed diagnosis," he added.

Can Mental Health Issues Trigger Heart Diseases?

Chronic stress can trigger harmful cardiovascular effects, including elevated blood pressure, increased heart rate, and inflammation—key contributors to heart disease. Anxiety and depression further impact heart health by disrupting sleep patterns, raising stress hormone levels, and encouraging unhealthy habits like poor diet and inactivity.

Mental health issues like depression and anxiety have a profound impact on the heart. They don’t just affect emotions but can increase inflammation and put extra strain on the cardiovascular system, warns Dr Srivastav.

Certain risk factors, such as obesity and diabetes, disproportionately affect women, making them more vulnerable to heart failure with preserved ejection fraction (HFpEF). However, due to gender-specific symptom variations, heart disease in women often goes undiagnosed for longer.

Obesity is more prevalent in women than men and is a major risk factor for heart failure. Diabetes, too, has a greater impact on women’s heart health, yet diagnosis and treatment delays are common. Addressing this gap requires increasing awareness, training healthcare providers, and promoting early diagnostic tools,” explains Dr Srivastav.

How Can You Protect Your Heart?

A simple yet effective way to support heart health is by committing to a brisk 30-minute walk daily. Walking not only helps regulate blood pressure and manage weight but also improves circulation and reduces stress.

"Regular physical activity, paired with a heart-healthy diet rich in fruits, vegetables, whole grains, and lean proteins, significantly lowers cardiovascular risks," advises Dr Srivastav.

Heart disease can often go undetected until a major event occurs, making routine screenings essential.

- For women: Begin screenings around age 30 and continue with regular checkups.

- For men: Start screenings at age 35.

Health screenings, including blood pressure checks, cholesterol tests, and electrocardiograms (ECGs), are critical for early detection of silent heart conditions.

Keltie Knight, Canadian-born American television presenter and a podcast host, now 43, a couple of years ago had blurry vision. She writes for Telegraph UK that she could not read the teleprompter on set. "I started to panic," she says.

She used to be a professional ballet before her career on television took off. She writes this made her so busy that her health started to deteriorate more and more. "I was so tired that I could have easily slept for 22 hours a day. The walk from my room to the bathroom became so exhausting that sometimes I wouldn’t have the energy to go. My hair started falling out, and I sometimes had rashes and hives all over my body for no reason," she writes.

She usually brushed off the most of it as stress-related, but one day her symptoms became unexplainable.

Keltie Knight Health Update: The Symptom That Triggered Her

She says that three years ago, things got "really bad". She could not see from one of her eyes, and her gum bled "profusely". She was depressed and started to blame herself for having a big career that destroyed her health.

"I told only my husband, Chris, how I was really feeling. I never took a sick day and never complained to anyone at work that I was feeling unwell. Chris was extremely supportive, but I wasn’t myself and I knew it was hard on him. I would come home after a long day of masking and be on another planet. I certainly wasn’t a present wife and constantly worried that I was never going to get better," she says

Keltie Knight Health Update: Doctors Gaslit Her For Years

She said that during that period she visited 15 different doctors. She had also gotten multiple iron blood infusions and tests for every possible disease. "Most of them just told me to eat more vegetables and get some rest."

After a lot of trial and error, she finally found a specialist who carried out an in-depth blood test, which is how she got a diagnosis. She was diagnosed with microcytic anaemia.

Keltie Knight Has Microcytic Anaemia: What It Means

It is a condition where a person's red blood cells are smaller than usual because they do not have enough hemoglobin, which is a protein present in the red blood cell. It helps the red blood cells carry oxygen throughout the body. Low hemoglobin also causes your red blood cells to be paler than normal or "hypochromic".

Keltie Knight Health Update: What Happened After The Diagnosis?

She was also told that her ferritin levels were "incredibly low". It was 8, while 15 is the standard.

"My doctor had a conversation with my gynaecologist and they decided that, due to my deficiency, the best thing they could do was to stop my period completely, because I was losing too much blood," writes Knight.

"We talked through a few options and decided on an ablation, which is effectively burning the lining of the uterus," she writes about her treatment options. However, when she went in for an MRI, her uterus was "heart-shaped", which meant an ablation could not work because the thermal balloon would not be able to reach all parts of it.

Keltie Knight Health Update: Treatment Options

Hysterectomy was the only solution she was left with. This meant that her uterus and her cervix would be removed. Which also meant that she would not only not get her period, but would never be able to have children.

"I had already decided that motherhood wasn’t the right path for me, but it was still a hard decision to make. On the one hand, I was desperate to get better, so I was willing for them to take my uterus and cervix out; on the other, getting a hysterectomy was so final," she writes. Throughout all, she notes, her husband Chris was very supportive.

While the surgery was successful, returning to work was a little bumpy. Returning to work after a month and standing up for long periods was difficult. She says she wore a corset under her clothes "to keep everything tight and upright" in a hope that things would eventually improve, and they did.

Eight months later, she does not have the rashes anymore, her hair is shiny and gorgeous, as she writes, and she was not tired all the time. "I finally felt like myself again."

Nipah virus outbreak in India has triggered screenings across Asian airports. However, the health authorities of the Kolkata hospital where two nurses were admitted confirmed that one of the two nurses has been discharged from hospital. While this may be a good sign, there is still need to be cautious of the virus.

Nipah Virus Outbreak In India: How Does It Work?

Experts and doctors are still telling people to be cautious of what they eat, as the fatality rates are from 40 per cent to as high as 75 per cent. It is a zoonotic infections that infects vital organs like brain and lungs. However, the virus is also able to manipulate body's immune system.

Nipah Virus In India: How Does It Affect Immune System?

Nipah virus is lethal because it can outpace, suppress and misdirect immune responses. Speaking to NDTV, Dr Dip Narayan Mukherjee, Consultant, Microbiology and Infectious Diseases at CK Birla Hospitals said, Nipah virus leaves the body unable to clear the infection in time. "Understanding this immune disruption is critical to explaining why Nipah causes severe encephalitis, multi-organ failure and high mortality, and why early detection and containment remain the most effective tools against it."

This immune disruption begins early in the infection. The body’s first line of defense against viruses is the innate immune system, which relies heavily on interferons. These signalling proteins alert neighboring cells to the threat and trigger antiviral mechanisms that slow viral replication.

“One of the earliest ways Nipah evades immunity is by interfering with the innate immune response,” Dr Mukherjee says. “The virus suppresses interferon activity, allowing it to multiply rapidly before the immune system can respond adequately.”

Research published by the World Health Organization and other virology institutes shows that specific Nipah virus proteins block interferon signalling pathways. This gives the virus a crucial head start, enabling widespread infection before the immune system is fully activated.

Read: Australia Is Monitoring Nipah Virus Outbreak In India

Nipah Virus Outbreak In India: Inflammation And Low Immunity

As the infection progresses, Nipah targets the cells lining blood vessels, a feature that sets it apart from many other respiratory viruses. Damage to these vessels allows the virus to spread to multiple organs, including the brain, while also triggering widespread inflammation.

Instead of a controlled antiviral response, the body releases large amounts of inflammatory molecules. This excessive inflammation leads to tissue injury, swelling and organ dysfunction, contributing to respiratory failure, neurological symptoms and circulatory collapse in severe cases.

Another hallmark of Nipah infection is immune exhaustion. Although the virus does not directly infect most immune cells, the intense inflammatory environment causes them to become overactivated and eventually dysfunctional. Once these defense cells lose their ability to control viral replication, the infection accelerates, and supportive care becomes less effective in later stages.

When Nipah crosses into the brain, immune control becomes even more limited. The brain’s immune responses are naturally restrained to prevent damage, allowing the virus to persist. At the same time, inflammation causes swelling, seizures and encephalitis. Neurological complications remain the leading cause of death in Nipah outbreaks.

Nipah Virus Outbreak In India: Why Antibodies Against The Infection Arrive Late

The adaptive immune response, which includes antibody production and virus-specific T-cells, also struggles to keep pace with the rapid spread of Nipah. By the time neutralizing antibodies are produced, significant organ damage may have already occurred, particularly in the brain. This delayed response explains why severe encephalitis is common even in people without underlying health conditions.

Using artificial intelligence (AI) in breast cancer screening can reduce the number of cancers diagnosed in late stages by 12 percent, according to a major new study from Sweden.

The study found that fewer women in the AI group were diagnosed with breast cancer in the years after screening. There were 1.55 cancers per 1,000 women in the AI-supported group, compared with 1.76 per 1,000 in the standard screening group.

According to lead author Dr Kristina Lang of Lund University in Sweden, this indicates better early identification of clinically relevant cancers. She said of the results: “Our findings show that AI-supported screening improves the early detection of breast cancers that are more likely to become aggressive or advanced.

“This results in fewer serious cancers being diagnosed in the interval between screenings.”

She added that wider adoption of AI-supported mammography could ease workforce pressures on radiologists while improving early detection, including of aggressive cancer subtypes.

What Did The Study Find?

The study, published in The Lancet, involved around 100,000 women who took part in routine mammography screening between April 2021 and December 2022, making it the first large randomised trial to assess how AI performs in real-world breast cancer screening.

Women were randomly divided into two groups. One group received standard screening, where mammograms were read by two radiologists and the other group had AI-supported screening, where an AI system assessed the scans first.

Low-risk cases were read by one radiologist, while higher-risk cases were checked by two, with the AI also flagging suspicious areas.

The results showed that 81 percent of cancers in the AI-supported group were detected during screening, compared with 74 percent in the standard screening group—a nine percent increase. Importantly, false-positive rates remained similar, at 1.5 percent in the AI group and 1.4 percent in the control group.

Despite positive results, Dr Lang cautioned that introducing AI into healthcare must be done carefully, using validated tools and continuous monitoring to understand how performance may vary across regions and over time.

READ MORE: This 2 Hour Activity Can Reduce Your Breast Cancer Risk, Study Shows

Breast Cancer: A Rising Crisis

About 1.9 lakh Indian women are diagnosed with breast cancer annually, meaning that a new case is diagnosed every four minutes. On average, a woman in India dies of breast cancer every eight minutes, highlighting how urgently the country needs stronger awareness, early diagnosis and sustained care.

One factor that sets India apart is the age at which women are affected. Almost half of all breast cancer patients in the country are younger than 45. This is a much higher proportion than seen in many Western nations, where the disease is usually detected later in life.

Moreover, sedentary habits, excessive consumption of processed foods as well as alcohol and smoking promotes obesity and hormonal changes which pave the way for breast cancer development.