Evaluating physical capacity in patients with chronic obstructive pulmonary disease: comparing the shuttle walk test with the encouraged 6-minute walk test.
OBJECTIVE
To evaluate the applicability of the incremental (shuttle) walk test in patients with chronic obstructive pulmonary disease and compare the performance of those patients on the shuttle walk test to that of the same patients on the encouraged 6-minute walk test.


METHODS
A cross-sectional study was conducted, in which 24 patients with chronic obstructive pulmonary disease were selected. In random order, patients were, after an initial practice period, submitted to a shuttle walk test and an encouraged 6-minute walk test.


RESULTS
The patients obtained a higher heart rate (expressed as a percentage of that predicted based on gender and age) on the encouraged 6-minute walk test (84.1 +/- 11.4%) than on the shuttle walk test (76.4 +/- 9.7%) (p = 0.003). The post-test sensation of dyspnea (Borg scale) was also higher on the encouraged 6-minute walk test. On average, the patients walked 307.0 +/- 89.3 meters on the shuttle walk test and 515.5 +/- 102.3 meters on the encouraged 6-minute walk test (p < 0.001). There was a good correlation between the two tests in terms of the distance walked (r = 0.80, p < 0.001).


CONCLUSIONS
The shuttle walk test is simple and easy to implement in patients with chronic obstructive pulmonary disease. The encouraged 6-minute walk test produced higher post-test heart rate and greater post-test sensation of dyspnea than did the shuttle walk test.
Rosa
Fernanda Warken
FW
Universidade Federal de São Paulo, São Paulo, SP, Brasil. fwrosa@yahoo.com.br
Camelier
Aquiles
A
Mayer
Anamaria
A
Jardim
José Roberto
JR
D000368:Aged; D000369:Aged, 80 and over; D001794:Blood Pressure / Q000502:physiology; D003430:Cross-Sectional Studies; D005080:Exercise Test / Q000191:economics / Q000379:methods*; D017079:Exercise Tolerance / Q000502:physiology*; D005260:Female; D006339:Heart Rate / Q000502:physiology; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged; D029424:Pulmonary Disease, Chronic Obstructive / Q000503:physiopathology*; D015203:Reproducibility of Results; D016138:Walking / Q000502:physiology*