By Sean Olson, University Relations
When older adults – particularly women – have a heart attack, they are likely to have another.
That doesn’t sit well with Dr. Patricia Crane of UNCG School of Nursing. She wants to find out why; she wants to help people be healthier and prevent that second heart attack, also called a myocardial infarction (MI).
In an effort to support her research, the National Institutes of Health has awarded Crane a $209,250 grant to study fatigue in post-heart attack patients, a group she has studied since 1998.
“I’m interested in, once a heart attack has occurred, how we can prevent it from happening a second time,” Crane said.
One of the most frequent symptoms in a post-MI patient is fatigue. Crane believes that, due to the fatigue, the patient is less active. This lack of physical activity, in turn, leads to an increased likelihood that the person will have a second MI. If Crane can find out the cause of the fatigue, and mitigate that symptom, then health care works may be able to decrease the likelihood of that second heart attack.
“What my research really focuses on is the symptoms,” Crane said. “That’s really the nurses’ focus. How do these symptoms, including fatigue, affect these patients’ daily life?”
To that end, she will study some 98 men and women age 65 and older who have had an MI. She’ll examine obesity, physical activity, blood levels, and a number of other factors.
According to experts, coronary heart disease is the single largest cause of death in the U.S. The majority of MIs occur in patients aged 65 and older. Within six years of an initial MI, 35 percent of women and 18 percent of men have another MI. More frightening is the fact that, since 1997, the percentage of women having a second MI has risen.
“Our long-term goal is to help these people feel better and prevent another MI,” Crane said.
