Quality of recalled dyspnoea is different from exercise-induced dyspnoea: an experimental study

Are volunteered and endorsed descriptors of recalled breathlessness consistent with descriptors of exercise-induced breathlessness? Are volunteered and endorsed descriptors of exercise-induced breathlessness consistent?

Within-participant, repeated measures, experimental study.

57 people with symptomatic chronic respiratory disease aged 71 years.

There were three conditions. The first was recalled breathlessness. Two conditions of exercise-induced breathlessness were created by getting the participants to undertake the 6-min Walk Test twice (breathlessness 1 and 2).

Descriptors of breathlessness were volunteered (where participants' used their own words) or endorsed (from a pre-existing list of 15 breathlessness statements).

Emotive descriptors made up 65% of recalled descriptors compared with 11% of exercise-induced descriptors, whereas physical descriptors made up 35% of recalled descriptors compared with 89% of exercise-induced descriptors. Of the 237 potential language pairs volunteered to describe recalled and exercise-induced breathlessness 1, only 27 (11%) were identical whereas of the 171 potential language pairs endorsed as describing recalled and exercise-induced breathlessness 1, 66 (39%) were identical. Of the 175 potential language pairs of descriptors volunteered to describe exercise-induced breathlessness 1 and 2, 72 (41%) were identical whereas of the 153 potential language pairs endorsed as describing exercise-induced breathlessness 1 and 2, 71 (46%) were identical.

The language used to describe exercise-induced breathlessness immediately after two walking challenges was similar. However, descriptions of recalled breathlessness did not consistently match descriptions of exercise-induced breathlessness, which may reflect the different contexts under which breathlessness was recalled and induced.