Edinburgh Napier University: High Impact Cardiovascular Interventions Programme

Spontaneous Coronary Artery Dissection (SCAD) is a life changing event that disproportionately affects women, often without warning and with long lasting physical and emotional consequences. Despite generally positive clinical outcomes, many people experience persistent chest pain, anxiety, fatigue and a profound fear of recurrence – alongside feeling misunderstood or unsupported by existing services.

This Burdett funded project set out to change that.

Working hand in hand with people living with SCAD, researchers co designed the UK’s first tailored recovery programme and a new Patient Reported Outcome Measure (PROM) that truly reflects what matters to patients. The result is a flexible, virtual, person centred intervention that supports both physical and psychological recovery – wherever people live.

Participants described the programme as reassuring, empowering and transformative. One to one consultations with SCAD informed professionals helped reduce fear, rebuild confidence and provide clarity around symptoms, medication and safe physical activity. An eight week exercise counselling programme focused on listening, motivation and individual goals, not pushing limits, enabling people to return to meaningful activity at their own pace.

The impact was clear. Participants showed significant improvements in mental wellbeing, confidence, physical function and symptom related anxiety. Just as importantly, staff reported the value of delivering care grounded in lived experience, with strong therapeutic relationships and specialist knowledge at its heart.

By shining a light on the unmet needs of partners and families, this work recognises that recovery from SCAD extends beyond the individual.

Together, these findings provide a powerful blueprint for more compassionate, effective and patient led cardiac care with benefits felt by patients, families and healthcare professionals alike.

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