Body image and depressive symptoms as correlates of self-reported versus clinician-reported physiologic function

This study examined the relationships between physiologic function, depressive symptoms, and body image among maintenance cardiac rehabilitation participants. Physiologic function was operationalized as both functional status and functional capacity.

Participants were 72 men (mean age = 67.3 years) all of whom had experienced a traumatic cardiac event (ie, myocardial infarction, valve replacement surgery, coronary artery bypass graft surgery, percutaneous transluminal coronary angioplasty), and had completed some type of physician-supervised acute cardiac rehabilitation (ie, phase I and phase II). Measures of body image (social physique anxiety and body appearance satisfaction), self-reported functional status, clinician-reported functional capacity (ie, V0(2) and peak power), and depressive symptoms were collected.

Hierarchic multiple regression analyses revealed that both functional capacity and functional status explained significant variance in social physique anxiety (R(2) = 0.11, P<.05 and R(2) = 0.18, P<.05, respectively), whereas only functional status was a significant predictor of body appearance satisfaction (R(2) = 0.37, P<.01). Contrary to our hypotheses, depressive symptoms were not significantly related to either psychosocial or physiologic indices of functional well-being.

Both patient perceptions of functional status and clinical measures of functional capacity are important aspects of psychosocial well-being among cardiac patients.