Acute Myocardial Infarction

Background: Death and morbidity are commonly occurred worldwide due toheart diseases and are becoming an increasingly important problem in the developing countriesincluding Pakistan. The left ventricular ejection fraction (LVEF) serves as a good assessmenttool to document beneficial effects of cardiac rehabilitation (CR) program in cardiac patients.Objectives: To evaluate the effect of short-term CR program on LVEF in patients with myocardialinfarction (MI). Study Design: Cross sectional and Case series study. Setting: Departments ofCardiology, Liaquat University Hospital, Hyderabad. Period: 1st January 2014 to 30th June 2014.Methods: 100 patients of less than 75 years of age with acute uncomplicated anterior wall oranterolateral wall MI, inferior and RV MI. Cases were randomized into two groups of age andsex matched 50 patients each. Group I (study group) patients were administered secondaryprevention advice and were started on the CR exercise protocol, Group II (control group) patientswere administered secondary prevention advice only. Results: At baseline, LVEF was 42.5% inthe study group and 41.4% in the control group patients and was statistically comparable. After10 weeks study group showed the LVEF of 47.78% and control group had LVEF of 42.26%. Thedifferences are being statistically significant. Conclusion: Significant improvement in LVEF inpatients who had been engaged in CR program besides the secondary prevention strategieswhen compared with the control group patients who followed secondary prevention strategiesonly. The present study is amplify the beneficial effects of simple CR program, which additionallyimproves the key cardiac parameters like LVEF in the recovery period.