RESEARCH ARTICLE
Association Between Emphysema Score, Six-Minute Walk and Cardiopulmonary Exercise Tests in COPD
Li-Fei Chen§, Chun-Hua Wang*, §, Pai-Chien Chou, Shu-Chuan Ho, Wen-Ching Joa, Te-Fang Sheng , Han-Pin Kuo#
Article Information
Identifiers and Pagination:
Year: 2012Volume: 6
First Page: 104
Last Page: 110
Publisher ID: TORMJ-6-104
DOI: 10.2174/1874306401206010104
Article History:
Received Date: 22/7/2012Revision Received Date: 15/9/2012
Acceptance Date: 16/9/2012
Electronic publication date: 2/10/2012
Collection year: 2012
open-access license: This is an open access article licensed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution Non-Commercial License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/3.0/) which permits unrestricted, non-commercial use, distribution and reproduction in any medium, provided the work is properly cited.
Abstract
Background:
High-resolution computed tomography (HRCT) has allowed in detection of airway wall abnormalities and emphysema, whose extent may correlate with the clinical severity of the disease in patients with chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD). Six minute walk test (6MWT) and cardiopulmonary exercise test (CPET) can determine functional status.
Methods:
A study was undertaken to investigate whether the extent of emphysema in COPD patients quantitatively confirmed by HRCT scoring was associated with distance walked, inspiratory capacity (IC) changes after exercise, anaerobic threshold of cardiopulmonary exercise and the BODE index (body mass index, airflow obstruction, dyspnea, exercise performance).
Results:
Seventeen patients with COPD underwent HRCT scanning, 6MWT and CPET. The emphysema score was highly correlated to forced vital capacity (FVC) (r=-0.748, p<0.001), forced expiratory volume in 1 second (FEV1) (r=-0.615, p<0.01), IC post exercise (r=-0.663, p<0.01) and dyspnea score post exercise (r=0.609, p<0.01), but was not associated with the BODE index. The distance walked during 6MWT was inversely correlated to emphysema score (r=-0.557, p<0.05). IC before exercise was highly related to the 6MWT. The change in IC after exercise was associated with the percent decline of oxygen saturation after exercise (r=0.633, p<0.01). Severity of lung emphysema in COPD patients was inversely correlated to VO2 max (r=-0.514, p<0.05) and anaerobic threshold (r=-0.595, p<0.01) of cardiopulmonary exercise.
Conclusions:
These results suggest that COPD associated with emphysema on HRCT is characterized by more severe lung function impairment, greater exercise impairment and cardiopulmonary dysfunction.
