[Age and effects of long-term cardiac training in patients with ischemic heart disease]

Ongoing with age decline of physical capacity reflects permanent processes of aging occurring in organism. It leads to a successive reduction of physical activity level, resulting with time in restrictions of independent life ability, which then causes anxiety and progressing social isolation.

Evaluation of relation between age and effort tolerance in patients with chronic ischemic heart disease and comparison of cardiac rehabilitation effects in two patient groups at significantly various age.

The study comprised 103 patients (69 males and 34 females) at the mean age of 61.2 +/- 0,8 years. The patients were referred to rehabilitation because of undergone invasive treatment of IHD, using CABG (44 pts) and PTCA (48 pts), or acute coronary syndromes (11 pts). The study group was divided to the two subgroups, "A" and "B", differing significantly (p < 0.01) from each other by age. "A" group was constituted by 30 the youngest patients, with the mean age of 51.6 +/- 0.5 yrs, whereas "B" group comprised 30 the oldest patients, with the mean age of 70.9 +/- 0.6 yrs. The examined groups were comparable as to the drug treatment, clinical status, echocardiographic parameters and BMI values. During the observation period no changes in treatment and diet were made. The all patients were subjected to six-month cardiac rehabilitation, consisting of cycle ergometer training (3 times/week) and generally improving exercises (2 times/week). The parameters analyzed were the values of metabolic equivalent (MET) obtained at the initial and the final exercise treadmill test, likewise the delta of MET.

For a population of 103 patients with IHD, the negative, statistically significant correlation Pearson's coefficient between age and MET values of initial and final exercise tests and insignificant Pearson's coefficient between age and values of MET delta were obtained. Comparison analysis of the mean MET of initial and final exercise test and the mean MET delta did not show any significant differences between the both examined "A" (young) and "B" (old) groups.

In the examined patients with IHD, there were observed a negative, significant correlation between age and effort tolerance before and after the cardiac rehabilitation cycle, and a lack of significant correlation between age and delta of effort tolerance. There was found no considerable difference concerning a delta of effort tolerance between the patients with IHD falling into the young and the old groups.