Sport Climbing with Pre-existing Cardio-pulmonary Medical Conditions

Abstract

Over the past 25 years sport climbing has developed from an elite extreme sport subculture pursued by few into a mainstream recreational sport enjoyed globally by climbers of all ages, climbing abilities, and with pre-existing health conditions. As the demands and grades of climbing difficulty have increased over this period, most scientific literature on sport climbing focused on acute injuries and overuse syndromes, or performance physiology in healthy adult males. The physiological response to sport climbing is more similar to that of resistance training (i.e., body building) rather than a predominantly aerobic sport (i.e., running, cycling), so that heart rate and blood pressure during a climb will be disproportionately high relative to the 'exercise' of climbing, and breathing may be irregular. Therefore this review sought evidence-based recommendations for recreational sport climbing participation by those individuals with pre-existing cardiopulmonary medical conditions including coronary heart disease, chronic heart failure, cardiac dysrhythmia, pulmonary diseases (i.e., asthma) or hypertension. This review defines the criteria that must be fulfilled for safe sport climbing by those with pre-existing cardiopulmonary conditions or those with hypertension.