Wow—here's a fascinating but frightening finding. Scientists at Ohio State University have found evidence that stress can speed the progression of malignant melanoma, a particularly aggressive kind of cancer. Since there's nothing more stressful than learning you have an aggressive form of cancer, this bad news seems especially unfair.
The evidence is suggestive, not iron-clad—the researchers were looking at the behavior of cancer cells in lab dishes, not in humans. But it's in line with work this group has been doing for the past few years. What they found was that when they dosed the cancer cells with norepinephrine—a hormone that's released as part of the "fight or flight" response—the cells reacted by producing enormously increased levels of a protein that's known to foster tumor growth.
Assuming this connection is real, there may be medications that can help block the effect of stress. But the finding makes me think about the powerful results other researchers have seen with techniques like mindfulness meditation, which is a Western, non-religious form of meditation. It's been shown to lower blood pressure, reduce anxiety, help with insomnia, even increase immunity; not coincidentally, it also lowers levels of stress hormones. It's one of those all-around good-for-you behaviors that I never seem to get around to, though I did buy a how-to mindfulness meditation CD a few years ago. This is the sort of research that might make me actually listen to it.