EXERCISE STUDIES WITH ELDERLY VOLUNTEERS

The practicalities of conducting exercise studies with elderly and ver y elderly people have not been well described. In order to help others plan and perform such studies we describe our experience of recruitin g volunteers, applying selection criteria, measuring strength, power, cardiorespiratory responses, and potentially related functional abilit ies. Exclusion criteria are offered, for safety and to characterize su bjects as free of disease which might alter their exercise performance . International agreement on these, or similar, criteria would be valu able. The budget must be adequate for prolonged recruitment before a s tudy and for the liberal use of taxis during it. With healthy subjects in their seventies, the coefficients of variation (CV) for repeated m easurements of strength and power were: handgrip 3%, isometric knee ex tension 6%, isometric elbow flexion 6%, and lower limb extensor power 90%. CV for isometric knee extension by healthy subjects in their eigh ties was 4%. Treadmill ergometry is more time-consuming than with youn ger subjects. During progressive treadmill tests, the heart rate inter polated to oxygen consumptions of 10 and 15 ml.kg-1. min had CV = 4% a nd 7%, respectively.