Acute Coronary Syndrome patients’ return to work

Abstract Introduction: cardiovascular diseases represent a major morbidity and mortality impact on the Brazilian society. Objective: to verify the Acute Coronary Syndrome (ACS) patients’ time to return to work; and to identify and correlate sociodemographic, clinical, psychosocial, and occupational variables that may influence that time and their work performance. Methods: cross-sectional correlational study conducted in 2015-2016 with 65 ACS patients who returned to work. The instruments used were: Sociodemographic Questionnaire; Work Performance Evaluation Questionnaire; Veterans Specific Activity Questionnaire; MacNew Heart Disease Health-related Quality of Life; Hospital Anxiety and Depression Scale; and Impact of Valvular Disease in Everyday Life. Mann-Whitney test, Dunn’s posttest, and Spearman’s correlation coefficient were applied. Results: participants took 7.3 months on average to return to work; the ones who performed manual labor took longer to do so. Professional performance was found to be strongly correlated with quality of life and, inversely, with anxiety and depression. Conclusion: data indicate the need to develop strategies to promote ACS patients’ return to work.