Type A behaviour: A suitable case for treatment?

Until the mid 1980’s Type A behaviour (TAB) was considered to confer the same magnitude of risk for coronary heart disease as smoking, hypertension and raised serum cholesterol. As such, it Was considered a suitable target for modification. Since then, two arguments have been suggested which counter such optimism: (i) some recent evidence suggests that TAB is not predictive of heart disease in post-infarction populations, and (ii) interventions do not modify the physiological substrate underpinning TAB and, accordingly, do not reduce risk for disease progression. The validity of each of these challenges is critically examined. It is concluded that TAB remains ‘a suitable case for treatment’.