It's the most wonderful time of the year, but it can also be the hardest on your heart.

The holiday season's combination of stress, cold weather, excessive eating and drinking and lack of sleep can add up to a well-documented condition called Holiday Heart Syndrome.

It's an irregular heartbeat in otherwise healthy individual that can result in a heart attack and death, said Dr. Jonas Cooper, an electrophysiologist with Butler Memorial Hospital.

Dr. Dean Wolz, a cardiologist at Butler Memorial, said this arrhythmia is known as atrial fibrillation and is often associated with overindulgence during the holiday season.

Cooper, who deals with the electrical properties of the heart, said, “There are a couple of different studies that show a rise in the rates of death from heart conditions and nonheart conditions.”

“Those actually peak at Christmas and New Year's,” said Cooper. “It's rather amusing in a sad way. There is a rise in death rates with clear peaks on Christmas Day and New Year's Day. The magnitude is a 1,000 more deaths a day than should be otherwise on New Year's Day and Christmas Day.”

“As interns you know you better be prepared for Christmas and New Year's,” he said.

Dr. David Rottinghaus, an emergency room physician at Butler Memorial, said he, too, has noticed a spike in heart attacks during the holidays.

“I think we see there's always some sort of tragedy or two, a heart attack, death or cardiac arrest on the holidays,” said Rottinghaus. “Anecdotally, it is hard for me to say how many I've seen working the emergency room on the holidays.”

Cooper said there are a variety of theories with some levels of substantiation to account for this rise in deaths.

First, Cooper said, people delay seeking medical treatment because they don't want to spoil any celebration.

“Strokes, heart attacks, severe illnesses are all very time-critical,” Rottinghuas said.

“On the holidays when you are around family and friends and experience chest pains or shortness of breath, no one wants to go to the hospital and get that checked out,” Rottinghaus said. “But unfortunate or bad outcomes come with delay of care.”

Other factors contributing to Holiday Heart Syndrome, said Cooper, include emotional stress and unhealthy diets and increased alcohol intake.

“It's known smoke can affect heart health. People are around fireplaces inhaling smoke and debris, triggering heart trouble and lung trouble,” said Cooper.

And people sometimes just quit taking their medications around the holidays, Cooper said, not wanting to deal with side effects.

It's a combination of factors that puts added strain on the heart, said Rottinghaus.

“It's the stress of the holidays. People off their normal schedule, they're not exercising as much. They're eating more and worse foods, getting less sleep. It's a lot of things that stress the body, and they are all additive and lead to the peak,” said Rottinghaus.

There could be another reason for an increase in the number of deaths on Chistmas and New Year's: sheer will power.

“It's really quite striking to see the data,” said Cooper. “But why these days and not the night before?”

“It makes you think that people are holding out to stay with families. It's known will power plays a big part,” Cooper said.

“Perhaps, mentally there is a bit of a release going on. They are thinking 'All right, I've seen the family. I can go now. I've had my last Christmas.”

And it's not just elderly people or people with heart conditions who are prone to Holiday Heart Syndrome, Cooper said, it affects a broad range of health conditions.

Wolz said treatment for an irregular heartbeat could include medication to thin the blood and lessen the risk of a stroke or a ministroke or administering an electrical shock to jolt the heart back into regular rhythm.

Cooper suggested to prevent Holiday Heart Syndrome in the first place you should maintain a semblance of a regular schedule during the holidays: continue to exercise, use moderation in your eating and drinking and get enough sleep.

Brianna Knapik, a registered dietitian and nutritionist at Butler Memorial Hospital, said the best way to moderate food intake is through portion control.

She said over the holidays people are drinking more alcohol and not eating the right nutrients and too many carbohydrates which are converted to fat. Added weight can lead to heart problems.

She also advised sticking to normal habits.

“Don't skip meals. 'I'm going to skip lunch because I am going to so and so's party tonight.' Try to stick to your regular eating habits, so you don't overindulge,” Knapik said.