Walking Speeds in Patients With Chronic Obstructive Pulmonary Disease

Repeatability and Utility of the Usual and Fast Walking Speeds in Patients With Chronic Obstructive Pulmonary Disease (COPD)

A growing body of evidence suggests that in individuals with chronic lung disease their walk speed is related to their daily function and quality of life. It is possible to assess their usual (routine) and fast walking speeds by getting them to walk in a flat hallway.

In individuals with chronic lung disease, we anticipate that their usual walk speed will be helpful in exercise prescription and use in multidimensional scoring systems. However, it is important to first determine the measurement properties of these two walk speeds.

Study Overview

• Status: Completed
• Conditions: Chronic Obstructive Pulmonary Disease
• Intervention / Treatment: Behavioral: Usual and Fast Walking Speeds

• Study Type: Observational
• Enrollment (Actual): 29

Contacts and Locations

Study Locations

• Canada
  • Ontario
    • Toronto, Ontario, Canada, M6M 2J5
      • Westpark Health Care Centre

Participation Criteria

Eligibility Criteria

• Ages Eligible for Study: 18 years and older (Adult, Older Adult)
• Accepts Healthy Volunteers: No
• Genders Eligible for Study: All

• Sampling Method: Non-Probability Sample

Study Population

Patients with stable moderate-severe COPD will be recruited from those under the care of a respirologist at West Park Health Care Centre

Description

Inclusion Criteria:

• Clinical and spirometric diagnosis of COPD
• Able to provide written informed consent

Exclusion Criteria:

• Unstable cardiovascular disease
• Acute respiratory exacerbation within 4 weeks
• Neurologic or orthopedic limitation to walking
• Inability to comprehend instructions in English

Study Plan

How is the study designed?

Number of groups / cohorts

1

Cohorts and Interventions

Group / Cohort	Intervention / Treatment
COPD patients; Usual and Fast Walking Speeds	Behavioral: Usual and Fast Walking Speeds; Stable patients with chronic obstructive pulmonary disease will demonstrate their usual and fast walking speeds over a 30 m course, with speed calculated over the middle 10 m using optical sensors. The test will be repeated after a 5 minute rest; this procedure will then be repeated on two subsequent days, at the same time of day, within one week.

What is the study measuring?

Primary Outcome Measures

Outcome Measure	Measure Description	Time Frame
Coefficient of repeatability for usual and fast walk speeds	Participants will be asked to demonstrate their usual and fast walk speeds over the middle 10 meters of a 30 meter straight track using optical sensors and a hand-held stopwatch. Participants will be instructed to walk at their 'usual' and 'fast' speeds as standardized instructions. The walk test will be repeated after a 5 minute rest and then repeated on two subsequent days, at the same time of day, within one week. This will be simply observational in nature with no planned intervention aside for controlling walking environment. The primary outcome is going to report a change in walk speeds from baseline and at 1 and 2 days using repeated measures as described by Bland and Altman (reference below).	At baseline and over 1 week period.

Secondary Outcome Measures

Outcome Measure	Measure Description	Time Frame
Agreement in walk speeds between optical sensors and stopwatch	Assess agreement between the use of optical sensors and stop watch time for the usual and fast walk speeds.	Baseline and over 1 week of testing.
Agreement in the Bode Index using six minute walk distance and usual walk speed.	To assess agreement in the calculated Bode Index using the six minute walk distance versus estimated usual walk speed distance over 6 minutes.	Baseline

Other Outcome Measures

Outcome Measure	Measure Description	Time Frame
Precision of achieving a targeted endurance time using the usual and fast walking speeds.	The usual and fast walk speeds will be used to predict the test speed for a high-intensity constant-speed endurance test that will achieve an acceptable endurance time of 2-15 minutes.	Baseline

Collaborators and Investigators

• Sponsor: West Park Healthcare Centre
• Investigators: Principal Investigator: Roger Goldstein, MD, FRCPC, Westpark Healthcare Centre

Publications and helpful links

General Publications

• Bland JM, Altman DG. Measuring agreement in method comparison studies. Stat Methods Med Res. 1999 Jun;8(2):135-60. doi: 10.1177/096228029900800204.

Study record dates

Study Major Dates

• Study Start: July 1, 2012
• Primary Completion (Actual): February 1, 2013
• Study Completion (Actual): March 1, 2013

Study Registration Dates

• First Submitted: January 9, 2013
• First Submitted That Met QC Criteria: January 13, 2013
• First Posted (Estimate): January 15, 2013

Study Record Updates

• Last Update Posted (Estimate): March 12, 2013
• Last Update Submitted That Met QC Criteria: March 8, 2013
• Last Verified: March 1, 2013

More Information

Terms related to this study

• Keywords: Pulmonary rehabilitation; Functional status; Exercise testing
• Additional Relevant MeSH Terms: Respiratory Tract Diseases; Lung Diseases; Lung Diseases, Obstructive; Pulmonary Disease, Chronic Obstructive
• Other Study ID Numbers: Goldstein_Walk_COPD