Introduction Cardiovascular disease (CVD) is the most common cause of death globally.1,2 In China, 7.7 million people died from CVDs in 2015; of these deaths, 7.4 million deaths were attributed to coronary artery disease (CAD).3,4 Percutaneous coronary intervention (PCI) has the benefits of less trauma and rapid recovery and has been widely used in clinical practice as the main treatment for CAD.5,6 However, PCI could only temporarily solve mechanical stenosis of the coronary arteries and is unable to prevent disease progression. In the presence of risk factors for the disease, patients are prone to adverse cardiac events such as stent stenosis and angina pectoris.7 As an effective intervention, cardiac rehabilitation (CR) has been shown to significantly reduce the incidence of adverse cardiac events in patients after undergoing PCI, which is important for improving patient prognosis after PCI.8,9 However, in most European countries, less than half of eligible patients participate in center-based CR.10 Compared with center-based CR, home-based CR can promote patient participation and has the same benefits as center-based CR in improving patients functional capacity and quality of life and reducing the risk of death.11 However, poor adherence to home-based CR remains problematic, which may be because patients preferences are not included in the home-based CR program during the long-term and self-helping process. A new type of decision-making model12shared decision-making (SDM)requires information sharing between the doctor and the patient and incorporates patients preferences into the decision-making process. Continue reading →

Grief is a strong emotion, but it is an eventuality of stress. In fact, most negative emotions are expressed when a person is said to be stressed. Continue reading →

Opinion It sounds like simple advice: if you think you or someone you know is having a heart attack, call 911. Yet, as a cardiologist, I can tell you that there are still far too many people who choose to drive themselves to a health care facility rather than calling 911 for an ambulance. Continue reading →

Times Report | Crookston Times Everyone knows Feb. 14 is Valentines Day. However, did you know that Feb Continue reading →