Collaborative Care for Depression Has Heart Benefit
Collaborative care for depression -- started in the hospital -- improves the symptoms of heart disease as well as depression, a study shows.
In collaborative care, a non-physician care manager coordinates a patient’s care with both a primary doctor and a psychiatrist. The care manager also educates the patient about depression, treatment options, and depression’s effects on heart disease. He or she also follows up with the patient to assess how well the patient is doing and whether the patient is sticking to the prescribed treatment.
In this six-month study, published in Circulation: Cardiovascular Quality and Outcomes, researchers followed 175 heart disease patients who had also been diagnosed with depression. The treatment the participants received began while they were still in the hospital, where they had been admitted for an abnormal heart rhythm, unstable angina, heart attack, or heart failure. According to the researchers, this is a critical time to intervene.
“That patients were easily identified and effective treatment begun before discharge is a crucial aspect of our study -- with a minimal amount of effort, those patients most in need for treatment received effective therapy before discharge, when the likelihood for missed opportunity to apply effective treatment rises,” the researchers write.
Source: http://www.webmd.com/heart-disease/news/20110308/collaborative-care-for-depression-has-heart-benefit