If you suffer from depression, you need to look for medical help right away, as depression has been linked to a series of serious medical conditions, one of the most serious being heart disease. The condition needs to be diagnosed immediately after it sets in, because it might worsen other conditions you’re suffering from such as asthma, angina, arthritis or diabetes.

This is exactly the subject of a new study published in the Nov. 26 issue of the Journal of the American Medical Association. Researchers at the University of California San Francisco led by Mary A. Whooley, MD, found that cardiac patients who had symptoms of depression had a 31 percent higher rate of cardiovascular events, such as stroke, heart failure, heart attack, transient ischemic attack and death. This seems to be the results of depression interfering with someone’s schedule of daily exercise. It is a known fact that depression makes people lose their “appetite” for exercise, turning them into couch potatoes.

These findings “raise the hypothesis that the increased risk of cardiovascular events associated with depression could potentially be preventable with behavior modification, especially exercise. Given the relatively modest effects of traditional therapies on depressive symptoms in patients with heart disease, there is increasing urgency to identify interventions that not only reduce depressive symptoms, but also directly target the mechanisms by which depression leads to cardiovascular events.”

How can you recognize depression? If you have at least 5 of the following symptoms every day, for a period of 2 weeks or longer, then you need immediate treatment: pervasive low mood and tearfulness, unresponsive to out of keeping with current circumstance; other mood tensions including tension, irritability and anxiety; insomnia; reduction in appetite, weight loss and constipation; lack of energy and tiredness/lack of stamina; loss of libido; loss of concentration; feelings of low-esteem, guilt and helplessness; thoughts of suicide.