Physical activity levels and sedentary behaviour pattern in cardiovascular disease patients attending a community-based phase III CR program

Abstract

Abstract Funding Acknowledgements Type of funding sources: None. Background/Introduction Cardiovascular rehabilitation (CR) programs are an effective component of recovery from cardiac events or revascularization procedures. The CR recommendations advise that cardiovascular disease (CVD) patients must be encouraged to improve their physical activity (PA) levels to meet the current guidelines. However, the sedentary behaviour (SB) in this population remains high during and following standard CR programs. Furthermore, SB targets and recommendations are still lacking and undefined. Purpose To characterize the pattern of SB and PA levels in CVD patients admitted to a community-based phase III CR program and after 12 months. Methods This retrospective cohort study included a total of 124 CVD patients admitted to a community-based phase III CR program (3 supervised exercise sessions/week). PA and SB were measured using accelerometers at baseline (M0) and after 12 months (M1). Outcome measures were minutes spent in light PA, moderate PA, vigorous PA, moderate to vigorous PA (MVPA) and SB, where the number of breaks/day was assessed (interruption in sedentary time of at least 1 minute). Results Eighty CVD patients (62±9 years; 83.8% male; 89% with coronary artery disease) completed all assessments. After one year intervention, minutes of MVPA decreased from 51±28 mins/day to 45±25 mins/day (p=0.021), despite the majority of patients (80%) targeting PA recommendations and 46.3% reaching more than 300 mins/week of MVPA. Light PA did not change from 3.0±0.8 hours/day to 2.8±0.9 hours/day (p=0.058) and SB remained high (M0: 11.1±1.3 hours/day vs M1: 11.0±1.4 hours/day, p=0.674). Our results showed that SB time was less fragmented in terms of number of breaks after one year (M0: 107±64 breaks/day vs M1: 92±29 breaks/day, p=0.030) and the difference in these SB periods did not change (p=0.201). Conclusion(s) Patients attending a CR long-term program kept their PA levels on target after one year intervention. The SB time remained high and there was a decline in number of breaks per day. Despite the aim to improve PA behaviour, our findings highlight the need to additionally address personalized interventions focused on changing the amount and distribution of SB.