Effect of Cardiac Rehabilitation Program on Right Ventricular Function after Acute Inferior Wall Myocardial infarction

Abstract

Abstract Aim and objectives To assess the role of cardiac rehabilitation on right ventricular (RV) functional recovery by 2D speckle-tracking echocardiography (STE) in a cohort of patients with successful reperfusion after the first episode of acute inferior myocardial infarction (MI) associated with RV infarction. Patients and Methods Fifty patients who underwent successful percutaneous coronary intervention (PCI) after inferior MI mainly associated with ECG criteria of RV infarction were prospectively included (56.08 ± 10.79 years, 40 Men). Twenty-five patients started an exercisebased cardiac rehabilitation (exCR) program after 2-4 weeks of discharge; another twenty-five patients, who were taken as the control group, received the usual care but didn’t participate in the cardiac rehabilitation program. Both groups received guideline-directed medical therapy (GDMT). Echocardiography (including 2D STE and conventional parameters for assessment of RV systolic function ) was performed at baseline, and after a 3-month follow-up for all patients. High levels of strain impairment were observed in both groups at baseline. All parameters improved at 3-month follow-up compared to baseline. Nevertheless, RV global longitudinal strain (GLS) and free wall strain (FWS) improved significantly for patients who completed the cardiac rehabilitation program compared to the control group. Conclusion Cardiac rehabilitation is effective in improving RV strain parameters in patients who developed acute inferior MI associated with RV infarction. Future studies should directly assess the prognostic significance of STE measures of RV function in this population.