Responsiveness of Exercise Tests in Pulmonary Arterial Hypertension
Status:
Completed
Trial end date:
2011-11-01
Target enrollment:
Participant gender:
Summary
Pulmonary arterial hypertension (PAH) is characterized by the progressive increase in
pulmonary vascular resistance leading to shortness of breath and exercise intolerance.
Exercise capacity has been used as the primary endpoint in most recent randomized controlled
trials evaluating PAH-specific therapies as it correlates with functional class and survival
in PAH. Exercise test is commonly assessed by the six-minute walk test (6MWT). However, there
is commonly some discrepancy between significant clinical improvement and minor changes
(generally <10% from baseline) in 6WMT following therapy. Because important clinical
decisions are based on patients' functional capacity, a reproducible and sensitive exercise
test is needed in PAH. The aim of this study was to compare the reproducibility and the
responsiveness of the 6MWT, the endurance shuttle walk test (ESWT) and the cycle endurance
test (CET) following pharmacological therapy in this disease.