mHealth Interventions for Lifestyle and Risk Factor Modification in Coronary Heart Disease: Randomized Controlled Trial

Background Self-management of lifestyle and cardiovascular disease risk factors is challenging in older patients with coronary heart disease (CHD). SMS text messaging could be a potential support tool for self-management and the most affordable and accessible method through a mobile phone. High-quality evidence had been lacking, and previous studies evaluated the effects of SMS text messaging on the subjective measures of short-term outcomes. Recently, a large-sized randomized controlled trial in Australia reported promising findings on the objective measures upon 6-month follow-up. However, an examination of the effectiveness of such interventions in an Asian population with unique demographic characteristics would be worthwhile. Objective This study examined the effectiveness of a 1-way SMS text messaging program to modify the lifestyle and cardiovascular disease risk factors of patients who underwent the first percutaneous coronary intervention (PCI). Methods A parallel, single-blinded, 1:1 random allocation clinical trial was conducted with 879 patients treated through PCI. They were recruited during hospital admission from April 2017 to May 2020 at 2 university hospitals in the Republic of Korea. In addition to standard care, the intervention group received access to a supporting website and 4 SMS text messages per week for 6 months regarding a healthy diet, physical activity, smoking cessation, and cardiovascular health. Random allocation upon study enrollment and SMS text messaging after hospital discharge were performed automatically using a computer program. The coprimary outcomes were low-density-lipoprotein cholesterol (LDL-C), systolic blood pressure (SBP), and BMI. The secondary outcomes were change in lifestyle and adherence to the recommended health behaviors. Results Of the eligible population, 440 and 439 patients who underwent PCI were assigned to the intervention and control groups, respectively. The 1-way SMS text messaging program significantly enhanced physical activity (P=.02), healthy diet (P<.01), and medication adherence (P<.04) among patients with CHD. Hence, more people were likely to control their cardiovascular disease risk factors per the recommendations. The intervention group was more likely to control all 5 risk factors by 62% (relative risk 1.62, 95% CI 1.05-2.50) per the recommendations. On the other hand, physiological measures of the primary outcomes, including LDL-C levels, SBP, and BMI, were not significant. Most participants found the SMS text messaging program useful and helpful in motivating lifestyle changes. Conclusions Lifestyle-focused SMS text messages were effective in the self-management of a healthy diet, exercise, and medication adherence, but their influence on the physiological measures was not significant. One-way SMS text messages can be used as an affordable adjuvant method for lifestyle modification to help prevent the recurrence of cardiovascular disease. Trial Registration Clinical Research Information Service (CRiS) KCT0005087; https://cris.nih.go.kr/cris/search/detailSearch.do/19282

Relationship between arm-to-leg and limbs-to-trunk body composition ratio and cardiovascular disease risk factors

We aimed to analyze the relationship of the distribution of body fat mass (FM) and fat-free mass (FFM) in the limbs and trunk with the prevalence of cardiovascular disease risk factors (CVD-RF). In total, 13,032 adults were selected from the KNHANES (2008–2011). The prevalence of hypertension, diabetes mellitus (DM), dyslipidemia, and metabolic syndrome (MetS) according to the arm-to-leg ratio and limbs-to-trunk ratio for FM and FFM was compared, respectively. The higher the arm-to-leg FM ratio, the higher the prevalence of CVD-RF (DM-male-OR 7.04, 95% CI 4.22–11.74; DM-female-OR 10.57, 95% CI 5.80–19.26; MetS-male-OR 4.47, 95% CI 3.41- 5.86; MetS-female-OR 8.73, 95% CI 6.38–11.95). The higher the limbs-to-trunk FM ratio (DM-male-OR 0.12, 95% CI 0.07–0.21; DM-female-OR 0.12, 95% CI 0.06–0.23; MetS-male-OR 0.06, 95% CI 0.04–0.08; MetS-female-OR 0.02, 95% CI 0.01–0.04), the higher the limbs-to-trunk FFM ratio (DM-male-OR 0.19, 95% CI 0.11–0.31; DM-female-OR 0.46, 95% CI 0.30–0.70; MetS-male-OR 0.39, 95% CI 0.31–0.50; MetS-female-OR 0.62, 95% CI 0.50–0.78), and the higher the arm-to-leg FFM ratio (MetS-male-OR 0.75, 95% CI 0.59–0.94; MetS-female-OR 0.73, 95% CI 0.58–0.92), the lower the prevalence of CVD-RF. The higher the FM of the legs compared to the arms, FFM of the arms compared to the legs, and FM or FFM of the limbs compared to the trunk, the lower the prevalence of CVD-RF.