Cardiac Rehabilitation with a Structured Education Programme for Patients with Chronic Heart Failure - Illness-Related Knowledge, Mental Wellbeing and Acceptance in Participants

Background: Chronic heart failure is a severe disease with increasing importance and difficult prognosis. Patient education is an essential component of medical rehabilitation, which is aimed at increasing self-management abilities and reducing mental symptom load in these patients. A newly developed patient education programme for heart failure was implemented as part of a three-week cardiac rehabilitation programme. The present study dealt with patients' acceptance of this programme, changes in disease-related knowledge, perceived health- and illness-related quality of life, and mental symptoms over the treatment course. Method: During inpatient cardiac rehabilitation, 64 patients (79.7% male) participated in this competence-focused programme for patients with chronic heart failure. Before, directly after and 6 months after participation in the programme, they filled in self-rating questionnaires on their mental wellbeing (HADS anxiety and depression), quality of life (SF-36, KCCQ), and a test of their knowledge on heart-related disease behavior. Additionally they were given an evaluation-questionnaire of the programme. Results: Evaluation of the programme given by the patients was very good. Knowledge and perceived quality of life had increased significantly at the end and 6 months after rehabilitation. Mental symptoms of anxiety and depressivity were reduced directly and also 6 months after rehabilitation. Conclusion: Over the course of a multidimensional cardiac rehabilitation programme focusing on training of disease-directed competences, patients felt better and were better informed. However, special attention needs to be given to possible deterioration effects education programmes can have in patients with increased trait-anxiety or hypochondriac tendencies.