Women in 50s suffer most from stress

Among the steadily increasing cases of stress-related patients, women in their 50s turned out to be the biggest victims, according to a recent study by the National Health Insurance Corporation.

The number of patients diagnosed with stress-induced diseases increased from 66,000 in 2005 to 101,000 last year, showing an average yearly rise of 15.3 percent. The number of female patients was 63,000, 1.7 times higher than that of male patients, according to the data.



People in their 40s and 50s together took up 39 percent of the entire patient group, respectively with 21,000 and 16,000.

Especially, women in the 50s group were the largest, with 355 patients in every 100,000, closely followed by women in their 40s with 339, early 60s with 306, late 60s with 292, and 30s with 284.

The number of cases in the teen group, though still ranked low on the stress chart, jumped by 80 percent over the last three years, showing an average rise of 22.7 percent per year, the data showed.

The female workers group listed 262 cases in every 100,000, followed by the female non-workers group with 226, the male workers group with 157, and the male non-workers group with 110. Especially, the stress patient population in the male workers in their 30s and 40s respectively doubled and tripled that in the male non-workers group of the same age, indicating the heavy impact of work-related stress on men of that age.

Among major cities and provinces, Daejeon topped the list with 288 patients and Seoul followed with 235 and Busan with 228, according to the data.

The total amount of health insurance paid on the medical care of stress-induced diseases rose from 8.3 billion won ($6.7 million) in 2005 to 15.9 billion won last year.

Experts advise people to release their stress in their everyday life. "Though stress is unavoidable, it may be released in healthy ways through physical exercise or other hobbies," said Gang Ji-in, psychiatrist in the NHIC Ilsan Hospital.

(tellme@heraldm.com)



By Bae Hyun-jung