: Her findings support the idea of a two-way relationship between emotional distress and heart health, where psychological symptoms can emerge in response to a cardiac diagnosis, while existing mood disorders can exacerbate physiological changes like increased heart rate and blood pressure.
For further reading on her specific scientific contributions, you can explore the National Institutes of Health (NIH) database for recent publications.
: She examines how dysfunctional metacognitive beliefs (like catastrophic worry or the perceived need to control thoughts) perpetuate anxiety and depression in cardiac patients.
: In one study involving an Italian cohort, psychological distress accounted for up to 37% of the variance in a patient's quality of life, even after adjusting for clinical factors like BMI.