Cardiac Rehab Helps Frank Kolski Overcome Exercise Fear after Heart Attack

After Frank Kolski’s heart attack, Nicholaos Xenopoulos, MD, placed two stents in Kolsi’s blocked arteries and ordered 36 one-hour cardiac rehabilitation outpatient sessions. But the idea of exercising frightened Kolski. “I’ll be honest with you, I was afraid,” says Kolski. “What are these exercises going to do to me? Would they cause another heart attack? Would the stents move and damage something else? I was scared!”

Although fearful, Kolski reluctantly followed his doctor’s orders and attended his first session at Roane Medical Center after his release from the hospital. His fears vanished as he watched other patients exercising while wearing heart monitors. “I was just hoping I could get through it,” he added. “The first couple of times I came, I went home and went back to sleep. Oh goodness gracious, I was tired!”

Kolski also found that he enjoyed the educational aspect of the program with lessons on nutrition, heart disease, medications, and lifestyle changes to keep the heart healthy.

Kolski not only completed all 36 sessions, he decided to continue into the maintenance phase of the program not covered by insurance. While maintenance is not as regimented, the therapists are just as involved. “They’ll come around and look at the intensity levels on whatever machine you’re on and they say, ‘you may want to increase it this way or that way,’ and I do.”

Kolski speaks highly of the cardiac rehab staff and program at Roane Medical Center “They built my confidence up and took my fear away.”