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Heart failure and depression
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Cardiology
Heart failure and depression
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Living with heart failure is a miserable business, and about 40% of patients with this label are clinically depressed. This is due to a complex mix of factors: the biochemical “feel-bad” f
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Forums » Open clinical » Cardiology » Heart failure and depression

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Forums  »  Open clinical  »  Cardiology  »  Heart failure and depression

Heart failure and depression

posted at 9/8/2012 11:29 AM BST on bmj.com
Posts: 82
First: 21/7/2010
Last: 9/8/2012
Living with heart failure is a miserable business, and about 40% of patients with this label are clinically depressed. This is due to a complex mix of factors: the biochemical “feel-bad” factors alone are too complex to list here, and they come from every system in the body, not just the left ventricle. Small wonder that depression in heart failure is associated with physical deconditioning and increased mortality.

This study recruited 2322 subjects with systolic heart failure and depression from the USA, Canada and France and randomised them to an exercise programme or guideline-based care. At a median follow-up of 30 months, two-thirds of both groups were dead – these people really did have failing hearts. Survivors from the exercise group had slightly lower depression scores. The authors admit that this may be of little importance in the greater scheme of things. I would suggest that this study is one more illustration of the fact that people with heart failure and depression are in the final trajectory of their lives, and badly need the supportive and palliative care that so few of them can currently access.

 

http://jama.jamanetwork.com/article.aspx?articleid=1273016

Re: Heart failure and depression

posted at 11/8/2012 5:50 PM BST on bmj.com
Posts: 873
First: 17/6/2011
Last: 17/5/2013
I agree with you in that heart failure is a very bad disease to be diagnosed with - even with all of our modern therapy many still die within one year. But I think our systems also let patients and carers dwn because we concentrate on the physical aspects of the illness and forget the rest.
sadian

Forums » Open clinical » Cardiology » Heart failure and depression