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Ischemia is the medical term for what happens when your heart muscle doesn't get enough oxygen. Ischemia usually happens because of a shortage of blood and oxygen to the heart muscle. It is usually caused by a narrowing or blockage of one or more of the coronary arteries (which supply blood to the heart muscle). In many cases ischemia is a temporary problem.
Triggers of angina can therefore include not only physical activity, but also emotional stress such as anger, as this can cause the heart rate to speed up. However, a plaque rupture causing a heart attack can happen at any time and will not necessarily be linked to any trigger. This scientific study is loosely concerned with stress and plaque ruptures, though it did not directly look at coronary heart disease or heart attacks. Rather, it looked at whether stress could alter the activity of the hematopoietic stem cells, which give rise to all other blood cells.