Long-term follow-up of very old heart failure patients enrolled in a trial of exercise training.

Little is known about how physical and psychological status changes with time in older heart failure patients. The authors followed up a cohort of 82 patients (mean age, 80.5 years) enrolled in a randomized controlled trial of exercise training in heart failure. Six-minute walk test, accelerometry, functional status, quality of life, anxiety, and depression were measured at baseline, 3 months, 6 months, and a mean of 19 months post-enrollment. There were no significant differences between the exercise and control groups at long-term follow-up. Six-minute walk distance declined by only 0.2 m/month in those attending final follow-up (vs 4.6 m/month in nonattenders; P=.03). Similar results were seen for other outcomes. Only a small proportion of the variance in change of any of the outcomes was explained by differences in baseline variables.