You hear a lot of stories about road rage. Drivers who get cut off by another car or who just want to go faster and feel another is obstructing them - drivers who resort to violence or running another car off the road because their frustration and rage is too great to contain.

I think about that often when faced with hairy traffic situations. Some people don’t seem to understand the concept of stop signs, red lights or simple courtesy. When a another car cuts me off, runs a stop sign, assumes the right of way or doesn’t seem to know that those blinking lights on his car are for signalling his intentions, I generally mutter or say something sarcastic. This is a great release for me but hardly effective because the other driver never hears my witty words of driving wisdom.

Tailgaters make up a large percentage of the bad drivers on the road, and may be the most dangerous if they aren’t quite “balanced” emotionally.

We have all experienced it. The car that stays inches off your bumper for miles. If you dared take your eyes off the road for a second, you could probably see their eye color in your rearview mirror, but you don’t dare because at any minute, they could come crashing into your car. Because someone made the unwise decision to license that jerk, you have to put up with their offensive driving attitudes. Worse, you can’t do a thing about it, because you don’t know if their driving is the most dangerous thing about them or if they pose another threat.

So when I read this story about Bernadette Head, a 39 year old woman who took arms against a sea of traffic, I didn’t know whether to decry her or applaud her.

Bernadette was a little fed up with tailgaters too. In the heat and frustration of rush hour traffic in Detroit, Bernadette pulled out a 9mm handgun and shot at the tires of a pickup she said had been tailgating her.

What Bernadette did is really just another form of road rage and bullying on the streets. The best form of defensive driving is to keep cool and not let what other drivers do affect your concentration or reactions.

But, if you listen very carefully, you might hear a silent cheer from all of us who secretly fantasize about doing the same thing.

It’s long been known that anger and hostility are risk factors for heart disease in men, but few of the studies on these risk factors have included women.

Researchers who conducted a women-only study into the effects of anger and hostility on women’s heart health state that women who exhibit outward expressions of anger may be at increased risk for coronary disease if they also have other risk factors such as age, history of diabetes and a history of unhealthy lipid (fat) levels in the blood.

“Our results appear to differ from the literature on males, particularly young males, in which hostility scores are found to be associated with coronary artery disease. However, the new data, combined with our previous findings, indicate that anger and hostility in women, as in men, do tend to cluster with adverse risk factors,” said Bairey Merz, one of the authors of an article in December, 2006, issue of the Journal of Women’s Health.

The anger and hostility research grew out of the Women’s Ischemia Syndrome Evaluation (WISE) Study, a multi-center, long-term investigation sponsored by the National Heart, Lung and Blood Institute. Bairey Merz chairs the WISE study and holds the Women’s Guild Chair in Women’s Health at Cedars-Sinai.

Citation: Journal of Women’s Health, Published Online Dec. 2006, “Anger, Hostility, and Cardiac Symptoms in Women with Suspected Coronary Artery Disease: The Women’s Ischemia Syndrome Evaluation (WISE) Study”

Outwardly expressed anger affects some women’s heart arteries