The relationship between physical activity levels and prognosis in geriatric patients diagnosed with acute coronary syndrome.

PURPOSE: This study aimed to investigate the relationship between Physical Activity (PA) levels and prognosis in geriatric patients diagnosed with Acute Coronary Syndrome (ACS) in the emergency department.

METHOD: Purposive sampling was used and 207 volunteer geriatric ACS patients were included. Since the obtained data did not follow a normal distribution, the Kruskal-Wallis H test, Dunn-Bonferroni test, Fisher-Freeman-Halton test, Spearman correlation coefficient, and receiver operating characteristic curve were used in the data analysis.

RESULTS

The findings revealed that the PA levels of patients diagnosed with major adverse cardiac events (MACE) in the emergency department was lower than that of patients diagnosed with non-MACE and patients who refused treatment/were discharged and diagnosed with MACE within 30 days (p = 0.001). Additionally, when comparing ACS risk scores (TIMI, HEART, and SVEAT), ACS risk scores were higher in patients diagnosed with MACE compared to patients diagnosed with non-MACE and patients who refused treatment or were diagnosed with MACE within 30 days after discharge (p = 0.001). Patients' PA levels were found to be negatively correlated with ACS risk scores TIMI (r = -0.202; p = 0.004), HEART (r = -0.387; p = 0.001), and SVEAT (r = -0.460; p = 0.001). ACS patients with high PA were found to have a lower MACE rate and mortality risk than patients with low and moderate PA (p = 0.001). Indeed, when examined patient prognosis, discharge, ward, coronary care unit, and intensive care unit services were directly related to PA (p = 0.001). These results indicate that higher PA may be associated with a reduced risk of ACS and mortality in geriatric individuals.

CONCLUSION

It is recommended that PA levels be considered when making treatment decisions in geriatric ACS patients, especially in borderline cases. Furthermore, PA may be a practical and potentially useful prognostic indicator in geriatric ACS patients; however, its integration into existing ACS risk scoring systems requires further validation in larger and prospective studies.