Top Things to Know: The Importance of Cardiorespiratory Fitness: The Need for a National Registry
Published: January 07, 2013
- Increasing attention is being given to the importance of physical fitness, both muscular fitness and especially cardiorespiratory fitness (CRF), for decreasing chronic diseases, promoting overall cardiovascular and general health, improving quality of life, and delaying cardiovascular disease and mortality in the U.S. population.
- Although CRF is recognized as an important marker of both functional ability and cardiovascular health, it is currently the only major risk factor that is not routinely assessed in either the general or specialized clinical setting.
- Given the importance of CRF, a compelling need exists to better define both normative and criterion-based CRF standards. Currently, there is no formal multicenter CRF database that provides a sufficiently representative sample of the US population that can be used to accurately interpret CRF measures.
- The purpose of this policy statement is to outline the importance of broadening the assessment of CRF and to provide the rationale for the development of a national adult CRF registry that would be representative of the entire US population.
- Additionally, this statement outlines how a national CRF database could enhance the value of CRF assessment in the US population and across environments, including the clinical setting and the workplace, as well as in the general public, to better inform our national policy efforts on physical activity, fitness, and health.
Citation
Kaminsky LA, Arena R, Beckie TM, Brubaker PH, Church TS, Forman DE, Franklin BA, Gulati M, Lavie CJ, Myers J, Patel MJ, Piña IL, Weintraub WS, Williams MA; on behalf of the American Heart Association Advocacy Coordinating Committee, Council on Clinical Cardiology, and Council on Nutrition, Physical Activity and Metabolism. The importance of cardiorespiratory fitness in the United States: the need for a national registry: a policy statement from the American Heart Association. Circulation. 2013: published online before print January 7, 2013, 10.1161/CIR.0b013e31827ee100.
http://circ.ahajournals.org/lookup/doi/10.1161/CIR.0b013e31827ee100