A Systematic Review of Depression and Anxiety in Patients with Atrial Fibrillation: The Mind-Heart Link

Table 3

A summary of the articles presented in the section on the connection between the pathophysiology of AF and depression and anxiety. Studies in italics only assessed depression. Studies in bold only assessed anxiety.

Study	Subject size	Aim of the study	Psychological test	Significant findings
The connection between the pathophysiology of AF and depression
Eaker et al. [18] (2005)	3682 patients from the Framingham offspring study were followed for 10 years	To report if tension and anxiety can cause coronary artery disease and AF	(i) Framingham tension scale; (ii) Framingham anxiety scale	(i) Tension was a predictor for coronary artery heart disease and mortality.; (ii) Tension was a predictor for AF.; (iii) Anxiety was a predictor of total mortality in men and women.; (iv) Anxiety was a risk factor for incident AF.
Rommel et al. [16] (2013)	289 patients with AF	To report the influence of obesity, physical inactivity, and depression in patients with stable AF	9-item Patient Health Questionnaire	(i) In unadjusted analyses, mild-to-moderate and severe depressions were associated with increased hs-CRP levels; (ii) In multivariate analysis, depression was no longer associated with increased hs-CRP levels
Son and Song [29] (2012)	114 patients with chronic AF	To report if increased hs-CRP levels are associated with depression in an AF population	(i) Type D Scale; (ii) Hospital Anxiety and Depression Scale (HADS)	(i) 32% of patients had Type D personality; (ii) Type D personality had higher hs-CRP levels
Tully et al. [30] (2011)	226 cardiac surgery patients	To report the incidence of new onset AF	Depression Anxiety Stress Scale (DASS)	(i) 24.8% had postoperative AF; (ii) Postoperative anxiety was associated with increased AF in CABG patients