Abstract Body: Introduction. Attending cardiac rehabilitation (CR) improves fitness and quality of life and decreases the risk of future death from heart disease. Unfortunately, once an individual finishes a CR program, continued participation in physical activity (PA) too often reverts to previous sedentary patterns and is even more prevalent among older adults. Thus, this pilot study tested the feasibility of a health coaching intervention to improve PA and physical function after CR among older adults.
Hypothesis. Compared to education alone, we hypothesized that health coaching would maintain or improve PA participation and physical function 3 months after CR completion.
Methods. A total of 13 older adults who graduated from CR were randomized to either an education or health coaching group for 3 months. The education group received one 30-minute education session within the first month of randomization. The health coaching group received 6 health coaching sessions across the 3-month study duration. Both groups received a Garmin wrist-worn device and step goal ranging from 5,000-8,000 steps per day based on baseline step count. The Senior Fitness Test assessed physical function at baseline and 3 months. Paired t-tests were used to test within-group differences in mean change of outcomes and independent t-tests were used to test between-group differences in mean change of outcomes.
Results. Participants were on average 70.8 + 7.0 years old, white (84.6%), and female (61.5%). Average step count adherence was 110.4% + 26.8% and 102.7% + 18.1% for the health coaching and education groups, respectively. Regardless of group, participants significantly improved their waist circumference (-3.3 + 4.4 cm; p = 0.019), chair stands (2.0 + 2.4; p = 0.015), arm curls (2.0 + 2.0; p = 0.005), and 2-minute steps (4.8 + 7.3; p = 0.043). Participants increased their average daily step count by 1194 + 1641 and 545 + 1762 in the health coaching and education groups, respectively. There were no significant between-group differences in this small sample.
Conclusions. This pilot study demonstrates utilizing health coaching and education to maintain or increase PA and physical function 3 months after CR is feasible. Future studies should employ a similar approach among a larger sample size to determine the relative efficacy and effectiveness of health coaching and education on PA and physical function after CR amongst older adult populations.