Anxiety in patients with acute coronary syndromes

Background and Objectives: Anxiety is frequently encountered in acute coronary syndrome. It is believed that the prevalence of anxiety among cardiac patients is between 15 and 50%. The goal of our study was to determine whether there is an associadon between current anxiety and anxiety tendency in patients with acute coronary syndrome. A secondary goal was to establish possible distinct features of acute coronary syndromes in patients with the anxiety. Methods and results: Our study included 30 patients suffering from acute coronary syndrome. To obtain additional data on physical and mental health, we applied specially designed and validated questionnaires. In a groups without the anxiety and intensive anxiety there were no patients, while in the group with mild anxiety there were 21 patients (70%) and 9 patients had moderate anxiety (30%). The average number of hospital treatments was significantly higher in patients with moderate anxiety (average 2.3). Patients who were first time hospitalized due to cardiovascular disease, at the highest percentage (81%) had low current anxiety. Those patients who had intensive anxiety traits and propensity to anxiety response had the highest average number of hospital days (9 days). Patients who had intensive anxiety traits had the lowest values of internal locus of control (had feeling that only themselves were cause of the disease). Conclusions: Current anxiety and anxious personality structure are strongly associated with the course of the coronary heart disease. In particular, this refers to the length of hospital stay and number of hospitalizations.