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Why Is Cardiac Rehabilitation A Must For Heart Patients?
 

As a number of studies had shown, heart disease patients participating in cardiac rehabilitation (rehab) after cardiac illness like heart attack can cut their risk of death by approximately 25 percent. This is quite similar to what other standard therapies such as cholesterol-lowering drugs (statins) and aspirin could do to the patients.

However, only 20 to 30 percent of cardiac patients are referred to a cardiac rehab program after discharging from hospital, and this is a fairly common phenomenon among many countries.

In order to increase referrals to cardiac rehab programs, researchers from Peter Munk Cardiac Centre, University Health Network explored multiple strategies at 11 hospitals across Ontario. Their strategies include using a discharge checklist for doctors and associated health professionals, electronic referral in medical records and talking with patients at the bedside.

They reported in the February 14 edition of the ‘Journal Archives of Internal Medicine’ that their strategies actually raise referrals by 45 percent, and by targeting both healthcare providers and patients, more than 70 percent of eligible patients enroll in cardiac rehab. It is believed that the rehab program could reduce patients’ risk of dying and improve their quality of life.

Even after taking into account of factors like patients' age and education, how heavily they had smoked before quitting, and how high their stress scores were at the start of the study, the relationship between abstinence and reduced stress level held true. Thus, the study supported the theory that dependency on cigarettes is itself a chronic source of stress.

Researchers, therefore, strongly urged every heart patient discharged from the hospital to enroll a cardiac rehab program. Doctors were also advised not to just discharge patients from the hospital without referring patients to these proven rehab services that would support patients in their recovery.

In illustrating the importance of cardiac rehab, the researchers mentioned a 55-year-old male who lost 30 pounds through the Center’s Cardiac Rehabilitation Program at Toronto Western Hospital (TWH) after having being diagnosed with an irregular heart beat in August 2009.

The patient, who had weight gain and heart trouble because of work-related stress, admitted that the cardiac rehab program was truly motivational. He said the rehab opened his eyes to the number of people who had heart conditions similar to what he had, and it came with a built-in support network. He graduated from the rehab program in April 2010 but continues to attend classes to keep his weight off.

Developing strategies for patients to cut or eliminate their risk of coronary artery disease, prevent or minimizing hospitalization, decrease mortality and improve quality of life are the aims of the researchers. They hope these strategies could help patients prolong their life and reduce their risk of having a second heart attack, or requiring a second heart surgery. More importantly, cardiac rehab saves money. A typical cardiac bypass surgery or open-heart surgery could cost about US$23,000 for each patient while rehab costs between US$1,000 and 1,500 per patient.

Cardiac rehab consists medical treatments and lifestyle modification, and is a program of exercise and information sessions that can assist patients getting back to everyday life as quickly as possible. There are a variety of services including education sessions, nutritional assessment with a dietician, risk factor treatment (hypertension, cholesterol and smoking cessation) by doctors and nurses, medication review with a pharmacist, targeted exercise prescription by an exercise physiologist, nurse or kinesiologist and supervised exercise.\

The purpose is to help patients understand their own conditions, recover from their surgery or heart attack, make changes to their lifestyle that will help improve their heart health, and reduce the risk of heart attack. Cardiac rehab should benefit anyone who had had heart attack, coronary angioplasty or heart surgery, and it would also help people who have angina or heart failure.

In Britain, heart disease patients should be invited to join a cardiac rehab program starting about 4 to 8 weeks after they leave hospital, according to the recommendation by British Heart Association (BHA). If heart disease patients have difficulty in travelling to a cardiac rehab program center, BHA urged them to talk to the cardiac rehab team about other ways they can benefit from the program. It is possible for them to follow a program in their own home with support from their local cardiac rehab team.

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