The Importance of Psychological Assessment and Support in Patients Suffering from Cardiovascular Disease or Undergoing Cardiac Treatment

Abstract

Psychosocial factors play an undoubtedly important role in the development of cardiovascular diseases and can also highly affect efficacy and outcome of cardiac treatment or the success of rehabilitation. These factors are proven to have a major role in patient evaluation in two ways: (1) risk factors are important in establishing prognosis and/or as (2) indicators of need for further specific psychological interventions. According to the literature available: depression, severe anxiety and other psychosocial characteristics are considered to be risk factors. These factors include low socio-economic status, chronic family or work related stress, social isolation or lack of support, negative emotions, affective dysregulation and also negative personality patterns or hostility. Identifying and examining these factors have great importance in multidisciplinary patient care. It is important to highlight the chances of adverse outcome and provide clinical solutions since many of the risk factors are treatable psychological conditions.