没错，心碎也能要人命

A family obituary in this morning's New York Times is announcing the death of the mother of Christine Brinkley at the age of 91 says:her heart never survived losing the love of her life for her husband who predeceased by seven weeks. It's very common after the death of a longtime spouse, but the sadness also a medical condition and worst of all, could truly be fatal as it often appears to be. Our report tonight from our chief medical editor Dr. Nancy Snyderan.

Cindy Bezon's husband Joel had been in the cardiac ICU of Maine Medical Center for three days, recovering from a heart attack. And she had a visual in a nearby waiting room.

-You are constantly waiting for someone to come out and talk to you.

-Sure.

-And you stressed hormones are off the charts.

-I was on urge. But I thought I was doing fine. And I thought I was handling it very well.

But she wasn't.

-I remember coming, standing by the nurse's station, talking to someone. And as I was talking, I said: well, I really feel dizzy. I remember grabbing onto a counter. I was just trying to hold on for support. At that moment, black cloud,just,curtain just came down over my eyes that I couldn't shake away. And that's the last thing that I remember.

Cindy was in full cardiac arrest, suffering from something literally called Broken-heart syndrome. Ninety percent of the patients who experienced it are post menopausal women, mostly over age of 55.

We think that it is women age, their hearts and small blood vessels around their heart become more susceptible to distress hormones. So a stress that you might experience at the age of 25 when your estrogen levels are high may not have the same effect on your heart as it might when you are 65 years old.

The extreme stress of her husband's medical crisis triggered Cindy's brain to send a signal to her adrenal glands which released an unusual surge of stress hormones into her blood stream. That surge rushed to her heart, essentially paralyzing part of it, causing it to bloom now like this and then shut down.

--There are cases of people dying of this condition and when I'm asked can you die of a broken heart, we absolutely say yes, you can.

Cindy and Joel both recovered. And now celebrating life's simple pleasures has taken on a new meaning.

--We don't sweat the small stuff. We live to enjoy life.

--Enjoy each other and we're grateful for every moment that we have.

This is not a heart attack. The symptoms may mimic one. Heart attack is caused by blockages. This is simply a case of the heart being stunned by all those chemicals rushing to it. It's a temporary malfunction. And the heart usually covers completely if it's recognized in time, important thing is to recognize it. I think they are frankly under-recognized in this country.

One of the true enduring medical mysteries. Nancy, thank you as always.