RECENT NEWS:

First guidelines on Women-focused Cardiac Rehabilitation by ICCPR published in the Canadian Journal of Cardiology

Women are an under-represented patient group in cardiac rehab, despite great need. Once enrolled, women are more likely to dropout and often don’t improve to the same degree as men. Therefore ICCPR embarked on a rigorous process to develop the first clinical practice guideline on women-focused CR: Ghisi GLM, Marzolini S, Price J, Beckie T, Mamataz T, Naheed A, Grace SL. Women-Focused Cardiovascular Rehabilitation: An ICCPR Clinical Practice Guideline. Canadian Journal of Cardiology. 2022. DOI: 10.1016/j.cjca.2022.06.021 This work was endorsed by 24 associations working with us on implementation. See more here.

ICCPR Cardiovascular Rehabilitation Foundations Certification (CRFC) Scholarship Winners Announced!

The International Council of Cardiovascular Prevention and Rehabilitation is pleased to congratulate 23 recipients of ICCPR CRFC scholarships. These support healthcare providers and trainees from low- and-middle income countries (LMICs) with the entire application fee of $100USD. The scholarships are funded by SOLVE-CHD National Health and Medical Research Council of Australia Synergy Grant led by Professor Julie Redfern. Completion of the CRFC demonstrates foundational understanding of all core CR components. We are delighted to have completely updated the CRFC based on the latest evidence this year. We look forward to having these recipients among the ~1400 other CRFCs globally, and counting….

We received many more applications than we had scholarships unfortunately. We encourage interested trainees and healthcare providers to explore the CRFC (https://globalcardiacrehab.com/Certification) and other training opportunities on our website (https://globalcardiacrehab.com/Training). And watch our social media channels as there will be a competition for a free CRFC scholarship in early 2023. We will also post news when each recipient passes their test and earns their CRFC!

ICCPR Cardiovascular Rehabilitation Foundations Certification (ICCPR CRFC) Scholarship Opportunity: Deadline May 29, 2022

The International Council of Cardiovascular Prevention and Rehabilitation (ICCPR) is pleased to open a call for applications for ICCPR CRFC scholarships to support healthcare providers and trainees from low- and-middle income countries (LMICs). The scholarship would cover the entire application fee.

The scholarships are funded by SOLVE-CHD National Health and Medical Research Council of Australia Synergy Grant led by Professor Julie Redfern.

To be eligible for the scholarship, the applicant must be: (1) a healthcare provider living in a LMIC (see which countries are categorized as LMI here), (2) practicing as a licensed CR clinician or be a formal trainee/student intending to work in this setting, and (3) follow the selection criteria here.

Video Overviews Available on ICCPR’s Registry and Program Certification

In case you missed it, the webinar recordings about ICCPR’s new International Cardiac Rehab Registry (ICRR) and Program Certification are now available on our website and YouTube channel. Therein, we reviewed ICRR objectives, development, the protocol, the process to join, and demo’ed the registry. In the latter recording, you can find an overview of the program certification processes and standards. Remember you can express your interest in joining the registry at any time by completing the program survey available here. Don’t hesitate to be in touch with any questions by emailing us at iccpr.icrr@gmail.com.

Sincerely, ICRR co-chairs Sherry & Karam Turk-Adawi, and User subcommittee chair for on-boarding Gabriela Ghisi. ICCPR Program Certification co/vice-chairs Emma Thomas and Aashish Contractor.

ICCPR launches Program Certification

ICCPR is delighted to announce its new Program Certification. See: https://globalcardiacrehab.com/Program-Certification

We will be hosting a webinar for those of you interested in learning more about ICCPR’s new International Cardiac Rehab Registry (ICRR) and Program Certification. It will be held on Monday November 15^th from 9-10am eastern. Interested sites can learn more and consider being a part. We will review ICRR objectives, give an overview of the protocol, the process to join, demo the registry, the program certification processes and standards,  and spend much of the time in Q&A (we want to hear from you!). If you are interested in attending, contact us to get calendar invite with login details at iccpr.icrr@gmail.com. If you can’t attend this session, not to worry as we will host another one a bit later at a time more concordant with business hours beyond the Americas. We will also record it and post it to our website.

Remember, you can express your interest in joining the registry at any time by completing the program survey available here. Don’t hesitate to be in touch with any questions at the gmail shown above, or to peruse the various pages of our website where you can find details on what the registry has to offer your program at no cost. We are so thrilled to have launched the registry this Fall with programs in Qatar and Iran, and to have finalized our plans for recognizing programs of high quality. In CR, we measure up! 

Sincerely, ICRR co-chairs Sherry Grace & Karam Turk-Adawi, and User subcommittee chair for on-boarding Gabriela Ghisi & ICCPR Program Certification co/vice-chairs Emma Thomas and Aashish Contractor.

Opportunity to learn about your patient’s information needs and CR barriers

ICCPR continues to work to meet the needs of our members, and their member CR programs. As you may know, we collate psychometrically-validated CR scales on our website for communicating to the CR community (see here), with permission. We would like to add further value by applying these scales to help the patients we serve.

We had previously developed a self-report version of the validated Cardiac Rehabilitation Barriers scale (CRBS) online (click here). Patients anonymously rate each barrier to either enrolling in CR or fully adhering to the program. Where they at least “agree” the item is a barrier, we return helpful suggestions on how to overcome their barriers, based on our knowledge of the literature. Patients using the resource have rated this as quite helpful. We have since gone on to now extend this to the Information Needs in Cardiac Rehabilitation (INCR) scale. Similarly, any item where patients rate they at least “want” information, we return an evidence-based, lay resource for the patient (often relying on the free Cardiac College which is used for patient education in CR, and is available in multiple languages). These are anonymous, and patients click to consent prior to starting the survey. This has been approved by a research ethics board in Canada. While nothing can replace the individualized care you provide in CR, this could be a complementary resource to share with your patients (whether they are just referred or just enrolling). To increase utility, we wanted have created in-built features and are happy to share with you about them. Please email us for more information.These are also available in Portuguese and Simplified Chinese at the same page.

ICCPR Sessions during the AACVPR Virtual Conference

ICCPR is very pleased to inform that will be delivering two virtual sessions during the AACVPR Virtual Conference (October 6-9, 2021). You can learn more about this online conference and register by clicking here.

Session 1: COVID and Cardiac Rehabilitation Around the Globe

Speakers: Professor Robyn Gallagher, Chair ICCPR (Australia); Dr Gabriela Melo Ghisi, Scientific Associate KITE Research Institute (Canada); Professor Susan Dawkes, President BACPR (United Kingdom); Professor Giulliano Gardenghi (Brazil); Dr Abraham Babu (India); Dr Aashish Contractor, Vice Chair ICCPR (India).

This session will provide key insights into the challenges and opportunities that the COVID-19 pandemic has presented to cardiac rehabilitation around the world and the global response. Speakers will present research results on two international surveys of the pandemic impact and response and the use of technology for delivery. Speakers from Brazil and India will highlight how f the issues that the pandemic has presented to the delivery of cardiac rehabilitation and how their service has responded.

Session 2: Cardiac Rehabilitation Delivery in Diverse Contexts

Speakers: Professor Robyn Gallagher, Chair ICCPR (Australia); Dr Tee Joo Yeo (Singapore); Professor Pamela Seron (Chile); Dr Rosalia Fernandez Coronado (Peru); Professor Nabila Soomro (Pakistan); Professor Sherry Grace (Canada).

This session will provide information on how cardiac rehabilitation is being delivered in different geographical and resource contexts around the globe from high to low and middle-income countries. Speakers will present strategies they are using to cardiac rehabilitation patient needs in their contexts including local innovations that respond to local contextual demands and resources.

ICCPR Registry Webinar: November 15th, 9am Eastern

Now that we are done usability testing, this fall we will also be hosting a webinar for those of you interested in learning more about ICCPR’s new International Cardiac Rehab Registry (ICRR). It will be held on Monday November 15^th from 9-10am eastern. Interested sites can learn more and consider being a part. If you are interested in attending, contact us to get calendar invite with login details at iccpr.icrr@gmail.com.

We will review ICRR objectives, give an overview of the protocol, the process to join, demo the registry and spend much of the time in Q&A (we want to hear from you!). If you can’t attend this session, not to worry as we will host another one a bit later at a time more concordant with business hours beyond the Americas. We will also record it and post it to our website. But you can express your interest in joining the registry at any time by completing the program survey available here. 

Don’t hesitate to be in touch with any questions at any time at the gmail shown above, or to peruse the various dropdown pages of our registry website where you can find details on what the registry has to offer your program at no cost. We are so thrilled to have our “soft launch” this Fall, and to be finalizing our plans for supporting participating programs in quality improvement and in recognizing programs of high quality (stay tuned!). In CR, we measure up! Sincerely, ICRR co-chairs Sherry & Karam, and User subcommittee chair for on-boarding Gabriela.

World Heart Day: September 29th, 2021

This year's World Heart Day is about USE HEART TO CONNECT. Use your knowledge, compassion and influence to make sure you, your loved ones and the communities you’re part of have the best chance to live heart-healthy lives. It’s about connecting with our own hearts, making sure we’re fuelling and nurturing them as best we can, and using the power of digital to connect every heart, everywhere. Learn more here.

SPCRS 2021

The Singapore Heart Foundation (SHF) organized its inaugural “Singapore Prevention and Cardiac Rehabilitation Symposium” in 2015, targeting local healthcare and allied health professionals with the support of National Heart Centre, National University Heart Centre Singapore, the Singapore Cardiac Society, International Council of Cardiovascular Prevention and Rehabilitation and World Heart Federation. The Singapore Heart Foundation (SHF) is organizing the 4th biennial Singapore Prevention and Cardiac Rehabilitation Symposium (SPCRS) on 23rd and 24th October 2021 (Saturday & Sunday) virtually for the upcoming edition due to the current Covid-19 situation. The invited speakers for this event include Professors Marco Perez from California, Daniel Piñeiro from Argentina, Susan Dawkes from United Kingdom and Dr Paul Oh from Canada. ICCPR is supporting this event. More in formation can be found here. 

ICCPR Webinar on delivery of CR during COVID-19: Lessons Learned

On April 29th 2019 ICCPR hosted another webinar on COVID-19 and CR. Speakers: Dr. Martin Heine from South Africa, Dr. Martha Supervia from Spain, Prof Giulliano Gardenghi from Brazil, Dr. Abraham Babu from India, Dr. Colin Yeung from Canada and Dr. Robyn Gallagher (ICCPR Chair) from Australia. Watch here.

Webinar on Women and CVD for Heart Month

We would like to bring your attention to a webinar that ICCPR sponsored in collaboration with Ireland’s National Institute for Prevention and Cardiovascular Health (NIPC), and our member American Society for Preventive Cardiology (ASPC; Pam Taub is their current ICCPR rep, and Martha Gulati [President elected] spoke on the webinar) for heart month. It was on women and heart health. Our immediate past-chair Prof. Sherry Grace spoke about cardiac rehab. This event happened on Feb 11, 2-3:30pm eastern time. Click here to watch.

New publication

Buckley JP, et al. Acute glycaemic management before, during and after exercise for cardiac rehabilitation participants with diabetes mellitus: a joint statement of the British and Canadian Associations of Cardiovascular Prevention and Rehabilitation, the International Council for Cardiovascular Prevention and Rehabilitation and the British Association of Sport and Exercise Sciences. Br J Sports Med. 2020 Dec 23:bjsports-2020-102446. doi: 10.1136/bjsports-2020-102446. Epub ahead of print. PMID: 33361136. Click here to read.

ICCPR new CR Program Email Distribution List

On December 18th, 2020 we have introduced our new CR Program Email Distribution List, through which we aim to disseminate information about cardiovascular prevention and rehabilitation directly to interested programs globally. Given there are not CR societies in every country globally who could be ICCPR members and hence hear about the latest CR information, upon suggestion of an ICCPR member, ICCPR Exec has recently approved a policy to reach out to individual CR program contacts to share information in support of our mission as outlined in our Charter. It shall serve as a mechanism to distribute time-sensitive announcements and information to CR programs globally. All communications will be vetted by ICCPR’s Secretary to ensure they meet with the policy, and frequency of emails shall be limited. The emails in the list will not be shared with any external parties. Click here to learn more and subscribe.

#LetsTalkICCPR

One of ICCPR's goals is to bring together national associations from around the world, to harmonize efforts in promoting CV prevention and rehab. This is why we are asking you to TALK about CR: use #letstalkiccpr on social media posts and share ideas, suggestions, barriers and initiatives with us.

ICCPR free, brief evidence-based online course for referral sources on how to promote CR to patients is now available in 5 languages

ICCPR convened a multidisciplinary, global panel of experts to develop a policy statement on promoting CR use in patients (enrolment, adherence and completion). We have also developed an accompanying online course, training inpatient cardiac healthcare providers on how to encourage their patients to utilize CR at the bedside. The course is available in English, Portuguese, Spanish, French and Simplified Chinese. Click here for more information and to access the course.

ICCPR has a YouTube Channel
ICCPR has a YouTube Channel where we will be posting videos of our events and initiatives. Please click here to access this page.

ICCPR Webinar on Cardiac Rehabilitation and COVID-19
On April 24th, 2020 ICCPR held its first webinar on Cardiac Rehabilitation and COVID-19. Nine speakers from 8 different countries presented to 300 participants from 20+ countries about challenges their CR programs are facing amidst COVID-19 pandemic and strategies and resources available to navigate these difficult times. It was reported that 48% of attendees have had to stop delivery of their CR programs during COVID-19 crisis. The recording of this presentation is available in our YouTube Channel - click here to watch. You can see more about COVID-19 initiatives here. 

ICCPR is now part of the EAPC Global Network
The EAPC Global Network is a precious resource for organizations involved in the promotion of excellence in research, practice, education and policy in cardiovascular health, primary and secondary prevention on a global scale. The aim is to facilitate international collaboration; the network is open to scientific societies active in the field of preventive cardiology. You can find more information about this group clicking here.

eLetter: “Cardiac Rehabilitation Effectiveness? A commentary from the International Council of Cardiovascular Prevention and Rehabilitation” .
On March 22, 2018 ICCPR Executive Committee leaded by former president John Buckley submitted an eLetter in response to the article Powell et al. published in the January 2018 issue of BMJ Open. This was a well-performed systematic review/meta-analyses, which pointedly challenges the effectiveness of cardiac rehabilitation. ICCPR’s commentary can be find here.

ICCPR launches ICCPR Cardiovascular Rehabilitation Foundations Certification (ICCPR CRFC)
On September 29, 2017 ICCPR launched the ICCPR CRFC program. The goal of this certification program is to increase capacity for CR delivery around the globe. This course educates students and practitioners on how to deliver all the core CR components, in accordance with ICCPR’s consensus statement on CR delivery in low-resource settings. Upon completion of the certification program, graduates will be equipped with the knowledge to deliver basic preventive and rehabilitation services for cardiovascular disease. For more information click here.

ICCPR publishes a paper on Advocacy for outpatient cardiac rehabilitation globally
In September 2016, an ICCPR team led by Dr. Abraham Babu published these guidelines, which will help countries across the world lead advocacy campaigns to have cardiac rehabilitation services included as part of their healthcare. Click here for the full version of the article: Click here for supplementary information on 4 advocacy success stories in different regions of the world.

ICCPR publishes guidelines for cardiac rehabilitation in low resource settings
In May, 2016, a team of researchers led by Dr. Sherry Grace, published these guidelines in the prestigious journal, “Heart”, of BMJ. This statement is endorsed by the leading cardiovascular prevention and rehabilitation societies, across the world. Click here for the full version of the article:  (Click here for the official press release)

The 2016 WHO Prize for Control of Cancer awarded to Dr Nizal Sarrafzadegan
Dr. Nizal Sarrafzadegan (Professor of Medicine/Cardiology and Director of Isfahan Cardiovascular Research Institute), who is one of our foremost members of the ICCPR has been awarded the 2016 WHO Prize for Control of Cancer, Cardiovascular Diseases and Diabetes in the EMR.