‘Leaky pipeline’: 80% of cardiac patients skip rehab in Aussie study
One-year mortality was 1% among attendees compared with 4.9% among non-attendees.
Only 20% of cardiac patients attend rehabilitation despite its association with lower mortality, an Australian study suggests.
The data linkage study of 37,191 adults undergoing percutaneous coronary intervention in Victorian public hospitals from January 2019 to December 2021 found that 7126 patients attended at least one public cardiac rehabilitation session: 19.3%.
While affected by COVID-19 lockdowns, the Monash University–led researchers said the results were still concerning.
“Less than half of eligible Australians are referred to cardiac rehabilitation after acute coronary syndrome, and less than a quarter receive guideline-recommended care at the point of discharge,” they wrote in the International Journal of Cardiology.
