[Prerequisites for the physical training of patients who have had a myocardial infarct (substantiation, functional diagnosis, indications, contraindications)]

The substantiation and the indications and contraindications for the physical training of patients who have had myocardial infarction are discussed on the basis of the experience gained at the Clinic of Internal Diseases of the Medical Department of K. Marx University in Leipzig (DDR) and the First Chair of Hospital Therapy of the N.I. Pirogov Second Moscow Medical Institute. On the strength of their own findings and the information in the current literature, the authors name, among other precoditions for training, diminution of capacity for muscular work, psychologic instability and the persisting threat of the progression of ischemic heart disease. The methods of functional diagnosis, which is also a necessary precondition for the physical rehabilitation of the patients are bicycle ergometry, auxiliary tests for the gaseous composition of blood and exhaled air, determination of the heart volume by means of X-ray, catheterization of the pulmonary artery with a floating catheter, ventriculography, and coronarography.