Nomogram based on metabolic equivalents and age for assessing aerobic exercise capacity in men

OBJECTIVES: The goal of this study was to create a nomogram, based on maximal exercise capacity (in metabolic equivalents METs) and age, for assessing a patient's ability to perform dynamic exercise to quantify the level of physical disability or relative capacity for physical activity. BACKGROUND: Providing an estimation of exercise capacity relative to age is clinically useful. Such an estimate can be derived from measured or estimated maximal oxygen uptake (in METs) from treadmill exercise testing and age. It is an effective means of communicating to patients their cardiopulmonary status, encouraging improvement in exercise capacity and quantifying disability. METHODS: Exercise test results of 1,388 male patients (mean age 57 years, range 21 to 89) free of apparent heart disease who were referred for exercise testing for clinical reasons were retrospectively reviewed. This referral group as well as subgroups of active (n = 346) and sedentary (n = 253) patients were analyzed to determine norms for age and for age by decades for exercise test responses, including METs, maximal heart rate and maximal systolic blood pressure. Regression equations were calculated from this information, and a nomogram for calculating degree of exercise capacity from age and MET level achieved by a patient was created. A similar analysis was performed in a separate group of 244 apparently healthy, normal male volunteers (mean age 45 +/- 14 years, range 18 to 72) who underwent exercise testing with direct measurement of expired gases. RESULTS: Equations for predicted METs for age were derived for the entire clinical referral group (METs = 18.0-0.15Age) and for the subgroups of active (METs = 18.7-0.15Age) and sedentary (METs = 16.6-0.16Age) patients. All results achieved statistical significance, with p values < 0.001. In the volunteer group of normal men who performed exercise testing with ventilatory gas exchange, the decline in maximal heart rate and METs with age was not as steep as in the referral group. Although the normal group confirmed nomograms published previously among similar subjects, the equations derived from the patients differed from those previously reported; in contrast to previous studies using healthy volunteers, the equations and nomograms for the referral group are more appropriate for patients typically referred for testing in a hospital or office-based internal medicine practice. CONCLUSIONS: Norms for METs based on age are presented as well as population-specific nomograms that enable physicians to assess patients' exercise capacity relative to their age group.