Exercise Prescriptions for Patients With Cardiovascular Disease

Completed

• Conditions: Cardiovascular Diseases

• Registration Number: NCT05449652
• Lead Sponsor: Hasselt University

Brief Summary

Physiotherapists are often confronted with patients with (elevated risk for) cardiovascular disease (CVD), even when this is not the primary indication for physiotherapy. Hence, physiotherapists should be able to provide evidence-based exercise advice to these patients, but this has not been assessed. The aim of this study was therefore to assess whether exercise prescriptions by physiotherapists to patients with CVD are in accordance with international recommendations.

Detailed Description

In this prospective observational survey, forty-seven Belgian physiotherapists agreed to prescribe exercise intensity, frequency, session duration, program duration, and exercise type (endurance or strength training) for the same three patient cases. Exercise prescriptions were compared between clinicians and relations with clinician characteristics were studied. In addition, the agreement between physiotherapists' exercise prescriptions and those from international recommendations (based on a maximal score of 60/per case) was assessed.

Study Timeline

• Study Start: 2022-02-16
• Primary Completion: 2022-04-30
• Study Completion: 2022-04-30
• Status Verified: 2022-07
• Study First Submitted: 2022-07-04
• Study First Submitted QC: 2022-07-04
• Last Update Submitted: 2022-07-04
• Study First Posted: 2022-07-08
• Last Update Posted: 2022-07-08

Recruitment & Eligibility

• Status: COMPLETED
• Sex: All
• Target Recruitment: 47

Inclusion Criteria

Currently professionally active Flemish physiotherapists

Exclusion Criteria

Not having access to a device that allows the use of the EXercise Prescription in Everyday practice & Rehabilitative Training (EXPERT) tool.

Study & Design

• Study Type: OBSERVATIONAL
• Study Design: Not specified

Primary Outcome Measures

Name	Time	Method
Program duration	February - April 2022	Assessment of program duration (expressed in number of weeks)
Session duration	February - April 2022	Assessment of session duration (expressed in number of minutes)
Exercise frequency	February - April 2022	Assessment of exercise frequency (expressed in number of exercise sessions per week)
Exercise type	February - April 2022	Aerobic exercise or strength exercise
Total exercise volume	February - April 2022	Multiplication of number of prescribed weeks, number of prescribed sessions/week, prescribed individual session duration and prescribed exercise intensity
Exercise intensity	February - April 2022	Assessment of the prescription of exercise intensity (expressed in heart rate in beats per minute)

Secondary Outcome Measures

Name	Time	Method
Association between exercise prescriptions and clinician characteristics'	February - April 2022	Relations between exercise prescriptions (intensity, frequency, session/program duration, exercise type) and clinician characteristics (age, gender, education, experience,...) were studied.

Trial Locations

Locations (1)

Hasselt University; 🇧🇪 Diepenbeek, Limburg, Belgium