Normative Values for Cardiopulmonary Exercise Stress Testing Using Ramp Cycle Ergometry in Children and Adolescents.

Objectives: To provide sex, age, and race specific reference values for ramp cycle ergometer cardiopulmonary exercise test (CPET) in children in the US.

Study Design: Retrospective review was conducted of all cardiopulmonary CPET data from our Exercise Physiology Laboratory on healthy children and adolescents (6-18 years) with body mass index between the 5th and 95th percentiles and structurally normal hearts who performed a ramp cycle ergometry stress test between 1999 and 2015. Twenty-eight exercise variables were included: peak oxygen consumption, oxygen consumption at ventilatory anaerobic threshold, peak work rate, resting and peak heart rate and blood pressure, resting pulmonary function testing, and ventilatory responses to progressive exercise using breath-by-breath gas exchange.