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The usefulness of exercise testing (ET) in old age is so far undefined particularly for detection of arrhythmias. We compared the diagnostic value of ET with 24-h long-term ECG recording (LT-ECG) in patients older than 70 years that were evaluated because of symptoms possibly related to arrhythmias. In 37 patients (age 72·8±2·7 years) the incidence of ventricular arrhythmias (LOWN≥1) was greater during ET (67%) than during 24-h L T-ECG recording (48%, P <0·01). Complex ventricular arrhythmias were detected in 6/37 patients (16%) by ET, in 9/37 patients (24%) by LT-ECG, in one patient (3%) by both tests and in 14/37 patients (37%) by one of the two tests, while 23/37 patients (63%) had no significant complex arrhythmias recorded by either test. During ET 12 patients (32%) showed signs of myocardial ischaemia with ST-depression ≥0·2 m V and/or increasing angina pectoris. In 42% of these patients complex ventricular arrhythmias LOWN≥3 occurred during ET. Thus both ET and LT-ECG are useful methods to uncover arrhythmias in symptomatic patients older than 70 years and have to be considered as complementary tools. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

Eight women and 4 men, mean age 71·1 years, examined by a clinical check-up participated in a bicycle ergometer training program (12 weeks with 3 training sessions per week). Symptom limited ergometric bicycle tests were performed before and after the training period. The training work load was continuously controlled by maintaining the training heart rate according to 60% of the maximum work load of the first test. To hold the training heart rate (HR) on a constant level the work load had to be increased systematically during the whole training period up to 180% of the level at the beginning. The working time in each training session was increased from 2 × 10 mm at the beginning up to 2 × 20 mm after the sixth week. The maximum work load (+ 16%) and the maximum oxygen uptake (+ 11%) increased significantly. The submaximal HR decreased significantly. In contrast there was no significant difference in maximum HR and maximal change of base excess between the initial exercise test and the control study at the end of the training program. This indicates that the increased exercise capacity represents a real endurance training effect and not only an increase in the degree of exhaustion. We conclude that also in healthy people between 67–76 years a significant endurance effect is possible when the training work load and training time is increased systematically according to the rules of training sciences. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]