Systematic Reviews
Copyright ©The Author(s) 2024. Published by Baishideng Publishing Group Inc. All rights reserved.
World J Cardiol. Jan 26, 2024; 16(1): 27-39
Published online Jan 26, 2024. doi: 10.4330/wjc.v16.i1.27
Safety and effectiveness of neuromuscular electrical stimulation in cardiac surgery: A systematic review
Christos Kourek, Marios Kanellopoulos, Vasiliki Raidou, Michalis Antonopoulos, Eleftherios Karatzanos, Irini Patsaki, Stavros Dimopoulos
Christos Kourek, Medical School of Athens, National and Kapodistrian University of Athens, Athens 15772, Greece
Marios Kanellopoulos, Vasiliki Raidou, Eleftherios Karatzanos, Stavros Dimopoulos, Clinical Ergospirometry, Exercise and Rehabilitation Laboratory, Evangelismos Hospital, Athens 10676, Greece
Michalis Antonopoulos, Stavros Dimopoulos, Intensive Care Unit, Onassis Cardiac Surgery Center, Kallithea 17674, Greece
Irini Patsaki, Department of Physiotherapy, University of West Attica, Athens 12243, Greece
Co-first authors: Christos Kourek and Marios Kanellopoulos.
Author contributions: Kourek C, Kanellopoulos M and Dimopoulos S conceptualized and designed the research; Kourek C, Kanellopoulos M and Raidou V performed the research; Kourek C, Kanellopoulos M, Raidou V and Dimopoulos S analyzed the data; Kourek C and Kanellopoulos M wrote the paper. All the authors have read and approved the final manuscript. Kourek C and Kanellopoulos M proposed and designed the research, performed data analysis and prepared the first draft of the manuscript. Both authors have made crucial and indispensable contributions towards the completion of the project and thus qualified as the co-first authors of the paper.
Conflict-of-interest statement: All the authors received no financial support for the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article.
PRISMA 2009 Checklist statement: The authors have read the PRISMA 2009 Checklist, and the manuscript was prepared and revised according to the PRISMA 2009 Checklist.
Open-Access: This article is an open-access article that was selected by an in-house editor and fully peer-reviewed by external reviewers. It is distributed in accordance with the Creative Commons Attribution NonCommercial (CC BY-NC 4.0) license, which permits others to distribute, remix, adapt, build upon this work non-commercially, and license their derivative works on different terms, provided the original work is properly cited and the use is non-commercial. See: https://creativecommons.org/Licenses/by-nc/4.0/
Corresponding author: Stavros Dimopoulos, MD, PhD, Director, Intensive Care Unit, Onassis Cardiac Surgery Center, Kallithea 17674, Greece. stdimop@gmail.com
Received: November 29, 2023
Peer-review started: November 29, 2023
First decision: December 12, 2023
Revised: December 14, 2023
Accepted: January 3, 2024
Article in press: January 3, 2024
Published online: January 26, 2024
Processing time: 51 Days and 1.7 Hours
Core Tip

Core Tip: Data regarding the effects of neuromuscular electrical stimulation (NMES) in cardiac surgery patients still remains limited. We investigated the safety and the effectiveness of NMES on functional capacity and muscle strength and function in patients before and after cardiac surgery. We observed that NMES has beneficial effects on muscle strength and function, but its effect on functional capacity is not clear. Moreover, NMES is safe and feasible for cardiac surgery patients without any major adverse events.