To evaluate the effect of hospital-based cardiac rehabilitation (CR) on quality of life (QOL) and physical ability in patients with myocardial infarction (MI).
Patients with MI who were referred to the Cardiac Health and Rehabilitation Center 2 weeks after percutaneous coronary intervention were divided into CR and non-CR groups. The CR group performed supervised exercises 3 times a week for 2 months. QOL assessment, using the 36-item Short-Form Health Survey (SF-36) and physical ability evaluation were performed at the beginning and end of CR.
The CR group demonstrated statistically significant improvements in physical functioning (PF), physical role functioning (RP), bodily pain (BP), general health perceptions (GH), vitality (VT), social role functioning (SF), emotional role functioning (RE), mental health (MH), physical component summary (PCS), and mental component summary (MCS). The non-CR group showed improvement in RP. Secondary outcomes, including resting heart rate (RHR), maximal oxygen consumption (VO2max), metabolic equivalent of task (MET), maximal exercise time (ETmax), stage 3 Borg rating of perceived exertion (3RPE), maximal Borg rating of perceived exertion (RPEmax), and stage 3 rate pressure product (3RPP), improved in the CR group. The non-CR group showed improvements in VO2max, MET, ETmax, and 3RPE. There were significant differences in improvements in PF, RP, BP, VT, SF, MH, MCS, RHR, VO2max, MET, ETmax, 3RPE, and 3RPP between the two groups.
Male patients with MI demonstrated improvements in QOL and physical ability following hospital-based CR; the impact on the mental component was greater than that on the physical component.
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To evaluate the degree to which the paralysis of a dominant hand affects quality of life (QOL) in patients with subacute stroke.
We recruited 75 patients with subacute hemiplegic stroke. Patients were divided into two groups according to the location of the lesion and the side of the dominant hand. Group 1 consisted of patients whose strokes affected the dominant hand (i.e., right hemiplegia and right dominant hand or left hemiplegia and left dominant hand). Group 2 consisted of patients whose strokes affected the non-dominant hand (i.e., left hemiplegia and right dominant hand or right hemiplegia and left dominant hand). The primary outcome measure was the Short-Form 36-Item Health Survey (SF-36), which was used to evaluate health-related QOL. Secondary outcomes were scores on the Modified Barthel Index (MBI) and Beck Depression Inventory (BDI).
We did not find any statistically significant differences between the groups in any SF-36 domain including the summaries of physical and mental component. Similarly, the MBI and BDI scores were not significantly different between the groups.
The effect of paralysis on the dominant hand and QOL in patients with subacute stroke was not significantly different from the effect of paralysis on the non-dominant hand.
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