To the Editors:
Congratulations to the European Respiratory Society (ERS) Task Force for updating their classic report on Clinical Exercise Testing 1 on its 10th anniversary. The original report 2 was the first to summarise the collective views on exercise testing of workers in the respiratory field, and the update provides an opportunity for reinterpretation in light of developments since 1997.
These new developments have included: 1) the emergence of evidence that cycle ergometry may not reproduce the respiratory symptoms of chest patients who are not cyclists; 2) an increased interest in the contribution of pattern of breathing to exercise limitation; and 3) a growing impression that ergometry may be beyond the competence of some lung function laboratories. The latter might have contributed to the paucity of material on exercise that was presented at the 2006 ERS Annual Congress.
We are concerned that these and related topics are not addressed adequately in the report, and so make additional suggestions for consideration by the Task Force.
Exercise capacity contributes to the management of both respiratory and cardiac patients and its assessment is an essential component of cardiopulmonary exercise testing 3. However, whilst the equipment, some protocols and a need to identify the affected bodily systems are shared, the requirements of the two disciplines subsequently diverge. Cardiologists rightly focus on indices of cardiac and …
