[Evaluation of daily activity in patients with COPD].

BACKGROUND Recently we could show that the daily activity in patients with hypercapnic respiratory failure as judged by the total amount of movements per day increased by 120% after 3 months of non-invasive mechanical ventilation. This study was designed to evaluate the reproducibility of the result of a movement detector in measuring daily activity of patients with COPD. PATIENTS AND METHODS 25 outpatients (11 females, 56 +/- 12 years old) with stable non-hypercapnic COPD (FEV1 = 47 +/- 9% predicted) were examined twice during a 7 days lasting interval, one month apart using a pedometer. RESULTS AND CONCLUSIONS The repeatability of the activity counts in the non-hypercapnic COPD patients was high (1st study period: 3,781 +/- 2,320 movements/d, 2nd study period: 3,626 +/- 2,149 movements/d) and in these patients activity correlated significantly with FEV1 (r = 0.54, p = 0.006).