Research & Innovation
Publications
Secondary prevention in the clinical management of patients with cardiovascular diseases. Core components, standards and outcome measures for referral and delivery
PMU Author
Josef Niebauer
All Authors
Massimo F. Piepoli, Ugo Corra, Stamatis Adamopoulos, Werner Benzer, Birna Bjarnason-Wehrens, Margaret Cupples, Paul Dendale, Patrick Doherty, Dan Gaita, Stefan Hoefer, Hannah McGee, Miguel Mendes, Josef Niebauer, Nana Pogosova, Esteban Garcia-Porrero, Bernhard Rauch, Jean Paul Schmid, Pantaleo Giannuzzi
Journal association
EUROPEAN JOURNAL OF PREVENTIVE CARDIOLOGY
Abstract
Despite major improvements in diagnostics and interventional therapies, cardiovascular diseases remain a major health care and socio-economic burden both in western and developing countries, in which this burden is increasing in close correlation to economic growth. Health authorities and the general population have started to recognize that the fight against these diseases can only be won if their burden is faced by increasing our investment on interventions in lifestyle changes and prevention. There is an overwhelming evidence of the efficacy of secondary prevention initiatives including cardiac rehabilitation in terms of reduction in morbidity and mortality. However, secondary prevention is still too poorly implemented in clinical practice, often only on selected populations and over a limited period of time. The development of systematic and full comprehensive preventive programmes is warranted, integrated in the organization of national health systems. Furthermore, systematic monitoring of the process of delivery and outcomes is a necessity.
Keywords
Cardiac prevention, Cardiac rehabilitation, Health care policy, High risk population