Introduction:

Congenital heart diseases are considered of great importance because they belong to the cardiovascular diseases leading to a high mortality rate.

Objective:

To determine the benefits of cardiovascular rehabilitation in congenital heart disease and to identify which parameters are appropriate when prescribing cardiovascular rehabilitation programs in patients with congenital heart disease.

Method:

Systematic review in combination with a descriptive analysis and retrospective chronology of scientific articles published in indexed databases from 2004 to 2019, aiming to obtain a broader picture of the rehabilitation programs. The data extracted included the type of population, intervention and control groups, types of congenital heart disease, time frame of the cardiac rehabilitation program, and frequency of intervention.

Results:

A total of 53,528 papers were found in databases after placing medical descriptors. At the end, 13 articles were selected, 5 experimental and 8 review articles. In these articles, improvements in quality of life, psychological aspects, among other effects were found, as well as data of importance to take into account in patients with congenital heart disease who are attending some type of cardiac rehabilitation program.

Conclusions:

There is a current need for the promotion and implementation of cardiac rehabilitation programs, consensuses and guidelines, focused on patients with congenital heart disease with a detailed prescription of the exercises implemented; as well as the patient being aware that the programs are safe and they do not present complications if properly developed.

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