Cited by 148Cardiac Health and Mental HealthOptimism, Hope, and Well-beingPsychological Well-being and Life Satisfaction

Development of a positive psychology intervention for patients with acute cardiovascular disease

Open access
Huffman, Jeff C., Mastromauro, Carol A., Boehm, Julia K., Seabrook, Rita, Fricchione, Gregory L., Denninger, John W., Lyubomirsky, Sonja·2011·Heart International

Abstract

The management of depression and other negative psychological states in cardiac patients has been a focus of multiple treatment trials, though such trials have not led to substantial improvements in cardiac outcomes. In contrast, there has been minimal focus on interventions to increase positive psychological states in cardiac patients, despite the fact that optimism and other positive states have been associated with superior cardiovascular outcomes. Our objective was to develop an 8-week, phone-based positive psychology intervention for patients hospitalized with acute cardiac disease (acute coronary syndrome or decompensated heart failure). Such an intervention would consist of positive psychology exercises adapted for this specific population, and it would need to be feasible for practitioners and patients in real-world settings. By adapting exercises that were previously validated in healthy individuals, we were able to generate a positive psychology telemedicine intervention for cardiac patients that focused on optimism, kindness, and gratitude. In addition, we successfully created a companion treatment manual for subjects to enhance the educational aspects of the intervention and facilitate completion of exercises. Finally, we successfully performed a small pilot trial of this intervention, and found that the positive psychology intervention appeared to be feasible and well-accepted in a cohort of patients with acute cardiac illness. Future studies should further develop this promising intervention and examine its impact on psychological and medical outcomes in this vulnerable population of cardiac patients.

The claims and statistics of this paper haven’t been checked yet.

Run the check — free, no account needed. It reads the open-access text and checks the sources it cites.

A few free checks a day · papers already verified open instantly · results are public

Integrity signals

Registry

Crossref · 10.4081/hi.2011.e14

Cites

71 of 71 references verified0 citation errors · 0 not checkable

Statistics

Claims the paper makes

The claims and statistics of this paper haven’t been checked yet.

Run the check — free, no account needed. It reads the open-access text and checks the sources it cites.

A few free checks a day · papers already verified open instantly · results are public

Claims other papers make about this one

Each is checked against this paper’s own text: does it say what the citing paper says it does?

  • Positive psychology interventions are well accepted by patients.

    “These interventions are well accepted by patients, require little staff training, and can be delivered remotely. 13-15”

    From Feasibility and acceptability of a positive psychological intervention for patients with type 2 diabetes (2016) · cites this paper as [14]

    The Abstract reports that the intervention appeared well accepted in a cohort of patients with acute cardiac illness. The Results also report favorable ease-of-completion and helpfulness ratings. These findings come from a small pilot of one intervention, so they do not establish that positive psychology interventions are well accepted by patients generally. (LLM, conf=0.84)

    Experimental — accuracy not yet measured
  • Prior studies of positive psychology interventions in other medical cohorts have found improvements in psychological and health behavior outcomes.

    “These findings are also consistent with prior studies 14,16,17 of positive psychology interventions in other medical cohorts that have found improvements in psychological and health behavior outcomes.”

    From Feasibility and acceptability of a positive psychological intervention for patients with type 2 diabetes (2016) · cites this paper as [14]

    The Introduction reports that positive psychology interventions improved happiness, depression, and well-being, and that resilience programs in medical patients included components of these interventions with good effect. But it says dedicated trials in medically ill patients were exceedingly rare. The Discussion > Limitations reports improved health behaviors from a program combining psychological and medical factors, not from a positive psychology intervention specifically. Page numbers are unavailable in our copy. (LLM, conf=0.84)

    Experimental — accuracy not yet measured
  • Positive psychology interventions require little staff training.

    “These interventions are well accepted by patients, require little staff training, and can be delivered remotely. 13-15”
  • Positive psychology exercises can be delivered remotely and require minimal training of providers.

    “In addition, they can be delivered remotely and require minimal training of providers. 12,14,41”
  • Positive psychology interventions can be delivered remotely.

    “These interventions are well accepted by patients, require little staff training, and can be delivered remotely. 13-15”

Self-check

Percentages, sums and reported differences re-computed from the paper’s own numbers.

The self-check needs the paper’s full text.

Cites

Flagged first, then by citations

1 of the 72 references couldn’t be matched to a known paper.

Research works printed but not linked: 2

  1. [25]Browning C Sims J Kendig H Predictors of physical activity behavior in older community-dwelling adults J Allied Health 2009 38 8 17 19361018
  2. [47]Lyubomirsky S The How of Happiness New York Penguin Press 2008

Cited by

Sorted by citations

Authors
Huffman, J. C., Mastromauro, C. A., Boehm, J. K., Seabrook, R., Fricchione, G. L., Denninger, J. W., & Lyubomirsky, S.
Affiliations
  • Harvard University (US)
  • Massachusetts General Hospital (US)
  • University of California, Riverside (US)
Corresponding author
Huffman, Jeff C.
Venue
Heart International
Published
2011-10-21
Volume
6
Issue
2
Pages
e14-e14
ISSN
  • 1826-1868 (ISSN-L)
  • 2036-2579
OpenAlex
W2163283444
Cited by
148
References
72
Citations by year
2025: 3 · 2024: 3 · 2023: 6 · 2022: 6 · 2021: 8 · 2020: 10 · 2019: 11 · 2018: 44 · 2017: 18 · 2016: 16 · 2015: 9 · 2014: 5 · 2013: 6 · 2012: 2
FWCI
3.08
Type
journal article
Language
en
Open access
Licence
cc-by-nc
Locations
  • Heart International (publishedVersion, cc-by-nc)
  • Europe PMC (PubMed Central) (publishedVersion)
  • PubMed Central (publishedVersion)
  • PubMed (publishedVersion)
  • Chapman University Digital Commons (Chapman University) (submittedVersion, cc-by-nd)
  • Digital Access to Scholarship at Harvard (DASH) (Harvard University) (submittedVersion, cc-by)
  • DOAJ (DOAJ: Directory of Open Access Journals) (submittedVersion)
  • eScholarship (California Digital Library) (submittedVersion)
Topics
  • Health Sciences › Medicine › Cardiology and Cardiovascular Medicine › Cardiac Health and Mental Health
  • Social Sciences › Psychology › Applied Psychology › Optimism, Hope, and Well-being
  • Social Sciences › Psychology › Social Psychology › Psychological Well-being and Life Satisfaction
Keywords
positive psychology interventions, acute cardiovascular disease, acute coronary syndrome, acute decompensated heart failure, optimism, kindness, gratitude, telemedicine, telephone-delivered intervention, treatment manual, feasibility, cardiac patients

About these checks

Registry, retraction, Cites and statistics results are computed, not judged, with one exception: a printed reference that no index lists is read once by a model before it counts as a citation error. Claims are extracted by a model and kept only when their quote appears verbatim in the text; each cited source is then checked, with a model’s help, for whether it says what the claim relies on. Those verdicts can be wrong — read the claim’s quote and the cited source before relying on one.

Statistics and arithmetic are recomputed, not judged.

Confidence bands are shown only for fields calibrated on our annotated test set. None is calibrated yet, so no band is shown.

What counts as a claim ›How we measure confidence ›How we check this ›

Are you an author, or do you see a problem with this page? Request a review