IMR Press / RCM / Volume 13 / Issue 4 / DOI: 10.3909/ricm0608

Reviews in Cardiovascular Medicine (RCM) is published by IMR Press from Volume 19 Issue 1 (2018). Previous articles were published by another publisher in Open Access under a CC-BY (or CC-BY-NC-ND) licence, and they are hosted by IMR Press on imrpress.com as a courtesy and upon agreement with MedReviews, LLC.

Open Access Review
The Usefulness of the Anaerobic Threshold in the Assessment and Prognostic Evaluation of the Patient With Dyspnea
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1 Institute of Cardiology, G. D'Annunzio University, Chieti, Italy
2 Institute of Molecular Cardiology, University of Louisville, Louisville, KY
Rev. Cardiovasc. Med. 2012, 13(4), 139–149; https://doi.org/10.3909/ricm0608
Published: 30 December 2012
Abstract
The anaerobic threshold (AT) is defined as the oxygen consumption level above which energy production becomes determined by anaerobic metabolism, which causes a sustained increase in lactate and metabolic acidosis. The AT, as measured by cardiopulmonary stress testing, is ubiquitously used to determine the prognosis and diagnosis of cardiovascular and respiratory diseases. This measurement can help clinicians in the functional evaluation of patients and as guidance for rehabilitation and therapy. This article reviews the pathophysiological aspects and methods of measurement of the AT during a cardiopulmonary stress test, and its clinical use in assessing cardiac and respiratory diseases.
Keywords
Anaerobic metabolism
Anaerobic threshold
Lactate threshold
Heart failure
Coronary artery disease
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