The effect of early rehabilitation nursing on the recovery of cardiac function in patients with acute myocardial infarction

OBJECT: This study aimed to investigate the effect of implementing early rehabilitation nursing on the recovery of cardiac function indices and prognosis after percutaneous coronary intervention (PCI) treatment in patients with acute myocardial infarction (AMI). METHODS: Patients diagnosed with AMI and treated with PCI between March 2020 and May 2024 were selected as the study participants. This was a prospective randomised controlled trial; patients were randomly allocated to an observation group and a control group using a random number table method (157 cases per group). The control group received routine nursing after surgery, whereas the observation group received structured early rehabilitation nursing. After 6 months of intervention, cardiac function indices, the incidence of major adverse cardiovascular events (MACE) and quality of life were compared between the two groups. Cardiac function indices included stroke volume (SV), left ventricular ejection fraction (LVEF), left ventricular end-diastolic volume (LVEDV) and 6-minute walking distance (6MWD). The World Health Organization Quality of Life Measurement Brief Form was used to evaluate quality of life. RESULTS: After nursing intervention, the levels of SV, LVEF and 6MWD in the cardiac function indices of the observation group were higher than those of the control group, whereas the levels of LVEDV were lower than those of the control group; the differences between the two groups were significant (p < 0.05). The total incidence of MACE in the observation group was lower than that in the control group (p < 0.05). In the comparison of quality-of-life scores, the observation group scored higher than the control group in five domains (p < 0.05). CONCLUSION: Early rehabilitation nursing for patients with AMI can effectively improve patients' cardiac function indices and reduce the risk of MACE, thereby improving their quality of life. CLINICAL TRIAL NUMBER: ISRCTN18094960.