Cardiopulmonary Physical Therapy Journal

Current Issue

April 2018 - Volume 29 - Issue 2

Editor-in-Chief: Sean M. Collins, PT, ScD
ISSN: 1541-7891
Online ISSN: 2374-8907
Frequency: Quarterly

About this Issue

In this issue of CPTJ we bring you three important and high quality original articles. Shoemaker et al systematically review the literature on daily physical activity in heart failure and you learn that exercise interventions used in isolation do not improve daily physical activity in patients with heart failure. The authors indicate and outline why further study on psychosocial interventions with objective outcome measurements is needed. This is a tremendously important contribution to the literature. Exercise capacity is simply a means to an end. And as Shoemaker et al point out, that means may be a necessary condition but it is not a sufficient condition to the end.

Frith and Loprinzi bring us an original study based on a large sample of individuals from the National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey (NHANES) study to test the association between physical activity and cognitive function. They nicely demonstrate that "physical activity is favorably associated with executive function among older adults with diabetes, but this association was attenuated after controlling for physical function and chronic illness."

Katijjahbe et al evaluate the minimal clinically important difference (MCID) for the Short Physical Performance Battery (SPPB) when evaluating physical function in patients after cardiac surgery.

In addition to providing an initial estimate of the MCID for SPPB in the early postoperative period this paper identifies the next steps required in this process since nearly half of the participants scored the maximum score at 4 weeks meaning that the SPPB may not be sensitive change because of the ceiling effect as patients recover.

Sean Collins, PT, ScD

Editor-in-Chief