Influence of Short Term Exercise on the Quality of Life of Patients with Chronic Heart Failure: Case Series from Saudi Arabia

ABSTRACT

Cardiac rehabilitation (CR) is a comprehensive disease management program for heart failure patients. Most of the heart failure (HF) guidelines are classifying the cardiac rehabilitation for heart failure patients as class 1A which mean highly recommended. However, Arab countries and Middle East are lacking specific CR programs and guidelines. In this study, five cases of chronic heart failure patients were exposed to short term regular exercise for maximum 8 weeks. With a mean of 5.6 exercise visits there are 19. 2% improvement in functional capacity, 35% improvement of exercise distance, 32.5% improvement in quality of life, 25% improvement in quality of sleep and decrease the emergency room visits by 37.5%.The significant improvement was in quality of life, exercise capacity and a decrease in ER visit for all patients.