KU Hospital opens heart rehab unit

"The University of Kansas Hospital has opened a new 2,600-square-foot rehabilitation unit on the fourth floor of its Center for Advanced Heart Care. The Outpatient Cardiopulmonary Rehabilitation Unit, a $500,000 project, will enhance the continuity of care at the heart-care center, a $77 million facility that opened in 2006. 'Patients now will be able to continue their recoveries with us in our new outpatient cardiac rehab program, instead of having to go elsewhere,' Eric Larson, the heart center's program manager for inpatient and outpatient cardiac rehabilitation, said in a release Monday. Outpatient cardiac rehabilitation is an individualized program of monitored exercise and education. Patients who have had heart attacks, heart surgery or treatment for heart disease are encouraged to attend three times a week for as long as 12 weeks. 'Statistically, those who enter an outpatient rehab program have a 75 percent better survival rate than those who don't,' Larson said in the release. Staff members of the new unit include nurses, an exercise specialist, a dietitian and a respiratory therapist" - Kansas City Business Journal