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AAFP Guideline for the Detection and
Management of Post–Myocardial Infarction
Depression
Ann Fam Med 2009;7:71-79. DOI: 10.1370/afm.918.
EVIDENCE-BASED RECOMMENDATIONS
The American Academy of Family Physicians (AAFP) Commis-sion on Science convened a panel to review the evidence on the effect of depression on persons after myocardial infarction. The
evidence report on this topic was published in May 2005 by the Agency
for Healthcare Research and Quality (AHRQ) and is used as the basis
for this review.1 The AAFP Post–Myocardial Infarction Depression Clini-
cal Practice Guideline Panel (Post-MI Guideline Panel) was charged with
examining the evidence and developing an evidence-based clinical practice
guideline for the detection and management of persons with postmyocar-
dial infarction (post-MI) depression.
The following recommendations are provided only as assistance for
physicians making clinical decisions regarding the care of their patients.
As such, they cannot substitute for the individual judgment brought to
each clinical situation by the patient’s family physician. As with all clinical
reference resources, they refl ect the best understanding of the science of
medicine at the time of publication, but they should be used with the clear
understanding that continued research may result in new knowledge and
recommendations.
Recommendations
Recommendation 1: Patients having a myocardial infarction should be
screened for depression using a standardized depression symptom check-
list at regular intervals during the postmyocardial infarction (post-MI)
period, including during hospitalization (Level A).
Insuffi cient data are available to support a recommendation of one particular symp-
tom checklist over another.
Recommendation 2: Post-MI patients with a diagnosis of depression
should be treated to improve their depression symptoms, with systems
in place to ensure regular follow-up and monitoring of their treatment
response and adherence to treatment (Level A).
The recommendation to screen for and treat depression in patients with myocardial
infarction is based on randomized controlled trials showing improvement in outcomes for
depression. Treatment of depression has not been found to improve cardiac outcomes per se,
though the evidence does not yet exclude the possibility of a small benefi t. The literature does
not provide guidance regarding the effects of treatment of depression on adherence to tertiary
prevention1* measures for coronary disease, such as diet, β-blocker, or aspirin use. The diag-
nosis of depression will be informed, not determined, by the screening instrument results from
Recommendation 1. Defi nitive diagnosis is ultimately the treating clinician’s responsibility.
Post–Myocardial Infarction
Depression Clinical Practice
Guideline Panel
Members of the Post Myocardial Infarction
Depression Clinical Practice Guideline Panel are
Lee A. Green, MD, MPH, Department of Family
Medicine, University of Michigan, Ann Arbor,
Michigan; W. Perry Dickinson, MD, University of
Colorado Health Sciences Center, Denver, Colorado;
Donald E. Nease, Jr, MD, Department of Family
Medicine, University of Michigan, Ann Arbor,
Michigan; Kenneth G. Schellhase, MD, MPH,
Department of Family & Community Medicine,
Medical College of Wisconsin, Milwaukee, Wiscon-
sin; Doug Campos-Outcalt, MD, MPA, American
Academy of Family Physicians, Leawood, Kansas;
Bellinda K. Schoof, MHA, CPHQ, American
Academy of Family Physicians, Leawood, Kansas;
Michelle Jeffcott-Pera, MA, American Academy of
Family Physicians, Leawood, Kansas
Confl icts of interest: none reported
CORRESPONDING AUTHOR
Lee A. Green, MD, MPH
Department of Family Medicine
Campus Box 0708
University of Michigan
1018 Fuller
Ann Arbor, MI 48190
greenla@umich.edu *In the cardiology literature, tertiary prevention is often referred to as secondary prevention.
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POSTMYOC ARDIAL INFARC TION DEPRESSION GUIDELINE
Recommendation 3: Selective serotonin reuptake
inhibitors (SSRIs) are preferred to tricyclic antidepres-
sants for treatment of depression in post-MI patients
(Level A).
Randomized controlled trials using SSRIs have shown
improvement in measures of depression among post-MI patients.
The evidence base for treatment with SSRIs is large enough and
follow-up has been long enough to show that SSRIs are safe in
the post-MI setting and do not share the adverse cardiac effects of
tricyclic antidepressants. Insuffi cient evidence is available about
other classes of antidepressants to make recommendations for or
against their use in post-MI patients.
Recommendation 4: Psychotherapy may be benefi cial
for treatment of depression in post-MI patients. The
existing evidence base does not establish what form of
psychotherapy is preferred (Level B).
Trials of psychotherapy have used a variety of types of inter-
ventions. Taken as a whole, the body of evidence supports benefi t
in reducing depression symptoms, but not all studies supported this
conclusion. Additionally, the heterogeneous nature of the interven-
tions studied precludes direct comparisons.
INTRODUCTION
Cardiovascular disease remains the leading cause of
death and disability among both men and women of
all ethnic groups in the United States. Depression is
an important predictor of morbidity and mortality
in patients with coronary heart disease, particularly
after a myocardial infarction, independent of previ-
ous cardiac history, coronary artery disease severity,
or residual left ventricular function.2 As many as 65%
of patients with acute myocardial infarction report
experiencing symptoms of depression, and major
depression is present in 15% to 22% of these patients.3
In 2003, the AAFP Commission on Clinical Policies
and Research (now Commission on Science) decided
there was a need for an evidence review on the effect
of depression on post-MI patients and successfully
nominated the topic to AHRQ. In May 2005, after
publication of the AHRQ Evidence Report Number
123,1 the AAFP established the Post-MI Guideline
Panel, which was composed of family physicians who
were well versed in practice guideline development
and the care of post-MI patients with depression. The
Post-MI Guideline Panel was charged with examining
the evidence and developing an evidence-based clini-
cal practice guideline for detection and treatment of
depression post-MI. The guideline was peer-reviewed
before being reviewed and approved by the AAFP
Commission on Science and by the AAFP Board of
Directors. The post-MI depression guideline describes
the historical context, the methods used to review the
literature, the results of the review, the evidence-based
recommendations, and recommendations for future
research in this area.
SCOPE
This guideline pertains directly only to patients who
have sustained ST-elevation MI (STEMI) or non–ST-
elevation MI (NSTEMI). Patients with unstable angina
and those with acute coronary syndrome relieved by
revascularization (thrombolysis, angioplasty, or bypass
surgery) have not been included in studies to date. The
studies available do not generally distinguish between
STEMI and NSTEMI.
Full discussion of the details and comparison of the
available screening tools is beyond the scope of this
guideline. The user is referred to the US Preventive
Services Task Force guideline on depression screening
for further information. This guideline is intended to
assist the primary care physician who is knowledgeable
about depression management to improve practice; it
does not replace training in depression management.
Management of subsyndromal depression, dysthymia,
suicidality, and details of psychopharmacology are
beyond the scope of this document.
BACKGROUND
Depression is a common occurrence after an MI, and
many studies (summarized below) have shown it to be
associated with an increase in subsequent coronary
events and with coronary-related mortality. The correla-
tion of depression with adverse cardiac outcomes has
led to trials examining the effect of depression treatment
on coronary outcomes as well as depression outcomes.
METHODS
The AAFP strength of recommendation taxonomy
(SORT)4 framework was used to grade the recom-
mendations for this guideline (see http://www.aafp.
org/online/en/home/publications/journals/afp/afpsort.
html for details). The recommendations were devel-
oped by discussion among the Post-MI Guideline Panel
members after review of the AHRQ Evidence Report
No. 123,1 completed by the Johns Hopkins University
Evidence-based Practice Center (EPC), and subsequent
evidence. Decisions were by unanimous agreement;
there was no voting, and the data were not amenable
to formal methods such as meta-analysis. The evidence
reviewed is summarized below.
AHRQ Evidence Report
The Post-MI Guideline Panel used the AHRQ Evi-
dence Report No. 123 as the basis for constructing
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POSTMYOC ARDIAL INFARC TION DEPRESSION GUIDELINE
this post-MI depression clinical practice guideline.
The report provides a full description of the methods
used in the AHRQ systematic review.1 Conclusions
are based on high-quality randomized controlled tri-
als unless otherwise stated. Each key question in this
guideline is one of the questions of evidence addressed
in that report as nominated by the AAFP. Recom-
mendations derive from the fi ndings of the evidence
report, as well as additional relevant evidence pub-
lished in English language peer-reviewed literature sub-
sequent to the date the EPC review was in fi nal form.
Updated Evidence Review
Because 2 years had elapsed since the original evidence
review, the Post-MI Guideline Panel conducted a sys-
tematic update of the evidence by reviewing studies
published since the AHRQ EPC report. An updated
literature search, addressing the same key questions
as in the AHRQ EPC report, was performed cover-
ing the time period from April 2004 to November 15,
2006. Unlike the original evidence report, the updated
report included only information from electronic
searches (ie, hand searches were excluded); however,
the databases searched were the same as in the origi-
nal AHRQ EPC report. Identical search terms were
used for the MEDLINE and Cochrane databases.1 The
search terms were slightly modifi ed for the remaining
3 databases (ie, EMBASE, CINAHL, and PsycINFO)
because of high rates of overlap with the results
from MEDLINE (see the Supplemental Appen-
dix, available online at http://www.annfammed.
org/cgi/content/full/7/1/71/DC1).
The literature search resulted in 809 articles. After
duplicates were eliminated, 2 reviewers independently
scanned the titles and made a determination regarding
relevance. The exclusion criteria used in the original
evidence report were also used in the updated litera-
ture review. Specifi cally, articles were eliminated if (1)
they were not in English, (2) they had no human data,
(3) they had no original data, or (4) there was no full-
text article to review (ie, it was a meeting abstract).1 If
both reviewers agreed that an article was irrelevant, it
was excluded from further review. Any discrepancies
were discussed and resolved by the reviewers.
All remaining articles were examined for relevance
based upon their abstracts. Each of the 2 reviewers
examined the abstracts independently. The reviewers
again had to agree to the relevance of the article for
inclusion or exclusion in the updated evidence review.
All discrepancies were discussed by the reviewers and
agreement was reached. If a citation did not have an
abstract or the reviewers could not agree on the rel-
evance, the full-text article was obtained. Consistent
with the AHRQ EPC report, abstracts were marked
for relevance to a key question, and those eliminated
were given a reason for elimination. This resulted in
71 articles being examined for full-text review.
Each full-text article was then examined for rel-
evance to the research questions. Consistent with the
original evidence report, information was also gath-
ered related to the methods and quality of the study.
Articles that were unrelated to the study questions
were again eliminated resulting in a total of 31 articles
for the updated evidence review (Table 1). The AAFP
Post-MI Guideline Panel made the determination that
this new body of evidence did not contribute any
substantive changes to the original evidence report
but added more support to it; therefore, both the new
evidence as well as the original report were used as the
evidence sources for this guideline.
RESULTS
The Post-MI Guideline Panel used the original key
questions as they were written in the AHRQ EPC
Table 1. Articles Related to Key Questions
Abbreviated Citation Key Question(s)
Akhtar et al,5 2004 1
Blumentha et al,6 2004 3
Carney et al,7 2004 3, 4
de Jonge et al,8 2006 1, 3
de Jonge et al,9 2006 3
Dias et al,10 2004 1
Dickens et al, 11 2006 1, 3
Dickens et al,12 2004 1
Drago et al,13 2006 1, 3
Fauerbach et al,14 2005 1, 3
Ginzburg,15 2006 1
Grace et al,16 2005 4
Grunau et al,17 2006 3
Huffman et al,18 2006 1, 5
Huffman et al,19 2006 1
Jaffe et al,20 2006 3
Kaptein et al,21 2006 1, 3
Lacey et al,22 2004 1, 4
Mallik et al,23 2006 1
McGowan et al,24 2004 1
Mohapatra et al,25 2005 1, 4
Parashar et al,26 2006 1, 2, 3
Parker et al,27 2006 1
Schrader et al,28 2004 1
Sorensen et al,29 2006 1, 3
Spijkerman et al,30 2005 1
Spijkerman et al,31 2006 1
Spijkerman et al,32 2005 1
Taylor et al,33 2005 4
Van Melle et al,34 2006 1
Ziegelstein et al,35 2005 1
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report1 to guide the evidence panel in collecting the
relevant research studies to best inform the report.
The questions as they are written below are rephrased
to be more relevant to practicing professionals but are
not changed in substance.
Evidence Summary
Evidence Question 1: What Is the Prevalence of
Depression During Initial Hospitalization for MI?
In the original AHRQ EPC report, prevalences var-
ied by type of measure used. For example, use of the
Structured Clinical Interview for the Diagnostic and
Statistical Manual (SCID) yielded prevalences rang-
ing from 17% to 27%. Including the ENRICHD trial
at 20%36 and validated depression scales, such as the
Beck Depression Inventory (BDI), yielded prevalences
ranging from 10% to 47%, depending on the cut
points used.37-43 The EPC report noted that there was a
medium quantity of evidence of reasonable quality to
address this question.
The updated evidence review continued to show a
wide range of prevalences (7.2% to 41.2%) depending
on the method used to assess depression. Structured
interviews tended to produce lower prevalence esti-
mates, and ratings scales, such as the BDI, produced
higher prevalence estimates.* In general, across the
studies, about 1 of every 5 patients with an MI has
depression during an initial hospitalization.
Evidence Question 2: What Is the Prevalence of
Continued Depression >1 Month Postdischarge and
Beyond?
It is important to distinguish among the time courses
of depression that may be identifi ed, ie, prevalent
depression that existed before the MI event and con-
tinues afterward, incident depression that begins after
an MI, recurrent depression that was in remission but
recurs after an MI, and incident depression immedi-
ately post-MI that remits spontaneously. Patients iden-
tifi ed as depressed at 1 month or longer after discharge
include patients with the fi rst 3 of these depression
time courses. Incident depression seems most relevant
to this guideline, as it is most closely related to the MI
event in its time course. In the EPC report 19 stud-
ies reported 1-month post-MI depression prevalence
data; however, only 3 studies specifi cally addressed
patients for whom depression was initially diagnosed
immediately post-MI, incident depression, and who
were observed for up to 1 month or longer. In these
patients, 1-month or greater prevalences ranged from
36.7% to 60%.38,44,45 Studies were rated as having a
medium quantity of evidence with reasonable quality.
The updated review of the literature found only 1 new
study that again reported a 1-month 35.4% prevalence
of depression in patients originally given a post-MI
diagnosis of depression.26
Evidence Question 3: What Is the Independent
Association of Measures of Depression With
Post-MI Outcomes?
The AHRQ EPC report identifi ed 11 independent
studies meeting inclusion criteria that provided data
on the association of depression with post-MI mortal-
ity.36,46-55 All 11 studies related depression, as assessed 1
time shortly after MI, to survival at times varying from
4 months to 10 years. Studies were judged to be gener-
ally of high quality. Eight found a statistically and clin-
ically signifi cant association between depression and
mortality, whereas 3 did not.56-58 The sex of the patient
did not appear to affect the relation between MI and
depression, nor did correction for other cardiac risk
factors. Subsequent to the AHRQ EPC report, several
additional publications meeting criteria addressed the
same issue.† All supported the association between
post-MI depression and cardiac-related mortality, with
a direct relation between severity of depression symp-
toms and probability of death.40
The AHRQ EPC report identifi ed 6 independent
studies meeting inclusion criteria that reported cardiac
event rates among depressed patients.50,59-63 Studies
were judged to be of moderate quality. One study50
found that the association between cardiac events and
depression disappeared with adjustment for fatigue
symptoms, and 2 others found the same when adjust-
ing for a measure of anxiety.61,62 Another60 found that
the association was signifi cant for older (older than 65
years) but marginal for younger patients. Studies of
similar methodological quality published since the EPC
report have shown relations between post-MI depres-
sion symptoms and hospital readmission21,26,29 and non-
fatal cardiac events or symptoms.8,13 Two adequately
powered studies26,29 did not support the relation
between depression and nonfatal events.
The AHRQ EPC report1 identifi ed 11 independent
studies meeting inclusion criteria that addressed qual-
ity of life among post-MI patients with depression.‡
A variety of effects on physical, psychological, and
social health and function have been shown for post-
MI patients with depression, some sex-specifi c and
some not, with a moderate degree of inconsistency
among the studies. These effects were seen across a
range of follow-up duration, from 3 months to 5 years.
The body of evidence was judged to be of low quality.
Most studies of quality-of-life measures since the EPC
report8,14,26 have similar fi ndings. One found no relation
* References 5,8,10-15,18,19,21-32,34,35.
† References 6,7,9,13,17,20,21,26,29.
‡ References 39,41,43,48,56,57,64-68.
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between depression at baseline (immediately post-MI)
and quality of life, though it did fi nd that a 6-month
post-MI measure of depression was associated with
reduced quality of life.
Three studies reviewed in the EPC report69-71 pro-
vided data on surrogate markers for risk of recurrent
MI. The studies, judged to be of high quality, found
consistent associations between post-MI depression
and abnormalities in the frequency spe