Is Grossarth-Maticek's coronary-prone Type II an independent predictor of myocardial infarction?

Biomedical factors (hypertension, abnormal lipid metabolism, clotting factors) and behavioural factors (cigarette smoking, alcohol, fat in take) are established risk factors for ischaemic heart disease (IHD). Accumulating evidence suggests that psychosocial factors (e.g. type A behaviour, interpersonal relations and personality) also exert some influence. These factors seem to account for about 3% of the varianc e in IHD over and above the traditional risk factors (Amelang, 1997). Grossarth-Maticek and colleagues have, in three prospective longitud inal studies, found that a particular type of coping in interpersonal relations (type II) predicted death from IHD over 10-15 years. The e fffect sizes have been of a magnitude far exceeding those reported in similar studies. This paper reports results from a cross-sectional, population-based, mailed questionnaire survey (N= 5,014). Using logis tic regression, we did not find a significant relation between Type I I and myocardial infarction, when controlling for age, IHD in the fam ily, diet, job stress and health complaints. Type II, however, had an effect on health complaints when controlling for age, IHD in the fam ily, and job stress. A path model including an indirect effect from t ype II to IHD via health complaints explained 23 and 44% of the varia nce in health complaints and IHD, respectively. A possible explanatio n for results showing that type II significantly affects IHD may be t hat smoking is the core factor in such a way that typeII is related t o health complaints and smoking.