Heart attack survivors who participate in cardiac rehabilitation programs may survive longer, but feel no healthier, than they would without this follow-up care, a U.S. study suggests.
Previous research has linked medically supervised rehab programs focused on things like stress reduction, exercise and heart healthy living to lower mortality rates. The current study offered more evidence of this: rehab participants were 41 percent less likely to die of all causes during up to seven years of follow-up.
But in the first year after a heart attack, patients who went through cardiac rehab had health improvements similar to the group that didn't, the current study also found.
