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 Compared to patients who didn’t receive stress reduction training,
those who did had a 50 percent lower risk of complications like
heart attacks and strokes, the study found.
“We know that exercise alone has important psychological benefits –
and improves overall health, said lead study author James
Blumenthal, a psychiatry researcher at Duke University in Durham,
North Carolina. In this study, he noted, adding stress management to
comprehensive, exercise-based cardiac rehab provided even further
benefit.
All 151 heart disease patients in the study received 12 weeks of
exercise-based rehab. Half of them also got weekly group sessions
for stress management that focused on things like relaxation
techniques and coping skills.
Researchers also tracked an additional 75 patients who were similar
to the rehab participants in age and health status but opted not to
join the exercise program.
Half the patients were followed for at least three years.
All rehab participants completed questionnaires measuring
depression, anxiety, anger and stress. They also had tests to assess
biomarkers of heart health such as cholesterol and heart rate.
As reported in the American Heart Association journal Circulation,
the people who received rehab and stress management fared better
than everyone else. In this group, 18 percent died or experienced
cardiac events such as heart attacks, strokes or recurrent chest
pains requiring hospitalization.
For the group that only received rehab, 33 percent experienced these
cardiac events, as did 47 percent of the group that opted against
rehab.
Due to its small size, the study didn’t include many deaths or
serious cardiac events, the authors note. The study was also too
small to measure the effects of specific interventions designed to
reduce stress.
Researchers also didn’t assess why certain people opted against
rehab, and it’s possible these patients differed in their medical,
financial or social circumstances in some way that influenced the
study results.
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Still, the findings suggest that this approach may help improve
cardiac rehab programs, which are standard for patients with heart
disease, said Dr. Eric Aldrich, a researcher in neurology and
rehabilitation at Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine in
Baltimore and vice president for medical affairs at Howard County
General Hospital.
“Given that heart disease is the leading cause of death in the U.S.,
this could represent a new treatment that will help us reduce the
impact of this disease,” Aldrich, who wasn’t involved in the study,
said by email.
Even though stress management may help, it isn’t a panacea,
cautioned Dr. Rod Taylor of the Institute of Health Research at the
University of Exeter Medical School in the U.K.
“Stress management is not curative therapy, does not necessarily
reverse the underlying disease, and will not work for all patients –
so hence some patients will continue to have adverse outcomes,”
Taylor, who wasn’t involved in the study, said by email.
SOURCE: http://bit.ly/1RxfKBZ Circulation, online March 21, 2016.
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