ABSTRACT
The assessment of exercise capacity is of critical importance in the evaluation and
management of patients with moderate to severe pulmonary arterial hypertension (PAH).
The practicing clinician uses various exercise modalities in evaluating and managing
patients with PAH. These include the 6-minute walk test (6MW), cardiopulmonary exercise
testing, and exercise echocardiography. The change in exercise capacity appears to
parallel other clinical indicators of disease severity, such as survival, hemodynamics,
and time to clinical worsening. Exercise testing can aid the clinician in outlining
the nature of a patient's exercise limitation, noninvasively assessing disease severity,
establishing prognosis, and evaluating the response to therapy. Additional work must
be done to validate the utility of measuring exercise capacity in patients with less
severe PAH.
KEYWORDS
Exercise testing - 6-minute walk test - cardiopulmonary exercise test
REFERENCES
2 as a measure of ventilatory efficiency and exercise limitation in patients with primary
pulmonary hypertension.
Chest.
2005;
127
1637-1646
oudiz@humc.edu
