Individualized Ramp Treadmill (13)

Second, the influence of incomplete stages makes the prediction of oxygen uptake from treadmill time or workload somewhat tenuous when using incremental protocols. In the present study, subjects were “credited” with both the predicted and measured oxygen uptake value at the instant the test was terminated. While this alleviates the problem of an incomplete stage, naturally maximal oxygen uptake would still be overestimated.
Individualizing the Ramp Rate: The Specific Activity Questionnaire
One obvious shortcoming of the approach described herein was the use of 2 tests. We performed the first test for 2 purposes: (1) to habituate subjects to the treadmill and gas exchange apparatus; and (2) to determine maximal oxygen uptake. Our goal was to evaluate how accurately a targeted test duration could be attained using the individualized approach; a measure of each subjects exercise capacity was necessary to do this with precision. Naturally, such precision would not generally be necessary. An estimation of a given patients exercise tolerance would generally be adequate to appropriately individualize the ramp rate.
We have recently employed a modified specific activity questionnaire- to estimate exercise capacity prior to testing for this purpose.

Category: Treadmill

Tags: diastolic blood pressure, gas exchange, treadmill