Mobile-phone-based Home Exercise in Chronic Obstructive Pulmonary Disease

Overview

Background: Moderate-intensity exercise training improves skeletal muscle aerobic capacity and increased oxidative enzyme activity, as well as exercise tolerance in Chronic Obstructive Pulmonary Disease (COPD) patients. Design: To investigate the home-based exercise training program can reduce inflammatory biomarkers in COPD. Setting: Conducted from January 2007 to December 2007 at a tertiary medical center, Chang Gung Memorial Hospital, Taiwan. Patients: Moderate to severe COPD receiving home exercise training, 12 using mobile phone assistance and 14 with free walk, were assessed for 6 months. Measurements: Incremental shuttle walk test (ISWT), spirometry, strength of limb muscles, C-reactive protein (CRP) and inflammatory cytokines.

Exercise training is the cornerstone of comprehensive rehabilitation programs in patients with COPD. Exercise training improves skeletal muscle oxidative capacity and efficiency that leads to a less alveolar ventilation at a given work rate. Patients can tolerate a heavier work load with less dyspnea under exercise. To date, it remains unclear whether and to what extent markers of low-grade systemic inflammation may affect trainability in clinically stable patients. Although specific exercise modalities can be applied to reverse muscle dysfunction, exercise intolerance, and reduced health-related quality of life, there is a substantial heterogeneity in the response to exercise training among patients with clinically stable COPD. Endurance exercise training has been reported to have consistently high clinical efficacy. Most pulmonary rehabilitation programs are hospital based and ask patients with regular supervision and monitoring in order to achieve persistent and optimal physiological benefits. However, compliance and time consuming with regular visits to the hospital or clinics are major stumbling blocks to the success of these programs. Recently, the investigators have developed a home-based exercise training program for stable COPD patients by asking them to walk at a speed controlled by the tempo of music from a program installed in a mobile phone. The tempo of music was set to keep the same walking speed at the intended level for endurance exercise training for all patients. Our mobile phone-based system provides an efficient home endurance exercise training program with good compliance and clinical outcomes in patients with moderate-to-severe COPD. This study was therefore designed to further explore whether the circulating level of inflammatory markers, such as CRP, IL-6, TNF-α, and IL-8, will be reduced in patients with COPD undergoing a mobile-phone assisted home-based exercise training program