The Efficacy of Self-care Behaviors, Educational Interventions, and Follow-up Strategies on Hospital Readmission and Mortality Rates in Patients with Heart Failure

Abstract

Heart failure (HF), a worldwide epidemic with significant morbidity and mortality risks, is frequently secondary to cardiovascular disorders and probably is the common final way to survive patients. Almost 25 of hospitalized patients with acute HF are expected to be re-admitted within 30 days post-discharge, and the rates of rehospitalization increase to almost one-third at 60 days and 60 percent within one year of discharge. Although care planning for patients with heart failure is complex, multidisciplinary, and resource-dependent, optimal self-care management along with appropriate educational intervention and follow-up strat-egy could be able to reduce readmissions, decline the duration of hospitalization, increase life expectancy, decrease the rates of mortality, and reduce costs of healthcare services for patients with HF. However, there are contradictions in previous reports about the effica-cy of self-care, mainly due to patients' non-adherence to self-care behaviors. Therefore, the current study aimed to review the investigations on the effectiveness of self-care of HF pa-tients in reducing hospital readmissions and increasing quality of life, and discuss novel ap-proaches for predischarge educational interventions and postdischarge follow-up strategies. GMJ.2023;12:e3116 DOI:10.31661/gmj.v12i.3116