Combination of low blood pressure response, low exercise capacity and slow heart rate recovery during an exercise test significantly increases mortality risk

Abstract

Aims: We investigated the combination of low systolic blood pressure (SBP) response, low exercise capacity (EC) and slow heart rate recovery (HRR) during an exercise test in mortality prediction. Patients and methods: Our population consisted of 3456 patients from the Finnish Cardiovascular Study. A failure of SBP to increase >42 mmHg was defined as a low response. Low EC was defined as < 8 metabolic equivalents. 1-minute HRR ≤18 bpm from maximum was defined as slow HRR. Results: During a median follow up of 10.0 years, 537 participants died. Reduced SBP response, low EC and slow HRR were independent predictors of all-cause and CV mortality (p