Ross Arena

University of Illinois Chicago | UIC · Department of Physical Therapy

Background: Postural Orthostatic Tachycardia Syndrome (POTS) is a syndrome of an exaggerated heart rate (HR) response with standing, disproportionately affecting young women associated with exercise intolerance due to dizziness, palpitations, and/or chest pain. Research question: How does the exaggerated increase in HR with standing translate into...

Background: Anatomic burden of coronary artery disease (CAD) has been considered a consistent prognostic marker. Inflammation also increases the cardiovascular risk and plays a significant role in the evolution of atherosclerosis. The progression of CAD impacts the responses to exercise, reducing functional capacity. Despite this knowledge, the spe...

Measures reflecting cardiac sympathovagal activity, particularly those associated with heart rate variability (HRV), are widely recognized and utilized in both scientific and clinical contexts. This study aimed to assess the inter- and intra-examiner reliability of short-term HRV parameters in patients hospitalized with coronavirus disease 2019 (CO...

Purpose Personal Activity Intelligence (PAI) translates heart rate during physical activity (PA) into a weekly score, that credits vigorous over low- and moderate intensity PA. We prospectively investigated the association between PAI and fatal and non-fatal coronary heart disease (CHD) in self-reported healthy participants from Norway, with specif...

Background Atrial fibrillation (AF) represents a global epidemic. Although international AF practice guidelines indicate weight loss for patients with AF and comorbid obesity (BMI ≥ 30 kg/m²) to alleviate symptom burden and improve prognosis, few cardiac rehabilitation (CR) programs include targeted weight loss treatment. Aims This RCT protocol wi...

Background The value of clinical cardiopulmonary exercise testing (CPET) within healthcare settings has been established in the last decade. CPET methods remain highly relevant in the COVID-19 endemic phase and should be used to assess those recovering from COVID-19 infection. This diagnostic tool could play an integral role in disease prognosticat...

Background The Duke Activity Status Index (DASI) questionnaire has been the focus of numerous investigations - its discriminative and prognostic capacity has been continuously explored, supporting its use in the clinical setting, specifically during rehabilitation in patients with chronic heart failure (CHF).However, studies exploring optimal DASI...

During the past century, there have been major developments in the medical and surgical treatment of cardiovascular disease (CVD). These advancements have resulted in more people surviving initial events and having reduced length of stay in hospital; consequently, there is an increasing number of people in need of ongoing and lifelong cardiovascula...

Objective This study aimed to test the efficacy of a mHealth-based workplace health promotion strategy in improving cardiorespiratory fitness in a healthcare setting. Methods Seventy-seven female nurses (age, 30–45 years) meeting the inclusion criteria underwent baseline assessment and received either a 12-week mHealth or awareness intervention ba...

Introduction: Health indices vary widely within the United States (U.S.), with clear “belts and epicenters” where the prevalence of unhealthy lifestyle behaviors, chronic disease, and disability are all high. Arthritis is a significant, well-established risk factor for developing chronic disease. In this paper, we hypothesize that the prevalence an...

Aim Poor cardiorespiratory fitness has been suggested to increase the risk of chronic diseases in obesity. We investigated the ability of key variables from cardiopulmonary exercise testing (CPET) to predict all‐cause mortality in an obese cohort. Methods The sample included 469 participants of both sexes (mean age 40 ± 13 years) who underwent a C...

Acute heart failure (AHF) classification and management are primarily based on lung congestion and/or hypoperfusion. The quantification of the vascular and tissue lung damage is not standard practice though biomarkers of lung injury may play a relevant role in this context. Haemodynamic stress promotes alveolar and vascular derangement with loss of...

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Objectives There are numerous population health challenges confronting the United States (U.S.), including the unhealthy lifestyle – chronic disease pandemics. However, the impact of unhealthy lifestyle behaviors and the increased prevalence of chronic diseases that result from them affect many facets of life outside of the health domain, and their...

Background A high minute ventilation/rate of carbon dioxide production (V̇ E /V̇ co 2 ) slope during exercise is prognostic for cardiovascular death. Recent data indicate that adults with either controlled or untreated primary hypertension, but not those with uncontrolled hypertension, exhibit a higher V̇ E /V̇ co 2 slope during exercise. However,...

The existence of noise, trends, ectopic beats, and artifacts can directly affect HRV quality, warranting signal correction. Our objective was to analyze the impact of different filters in the Kubios software on short-term HRV analysis in a COPD. A cross-sectional study involving 81 COPD patients was allocated into four groups according to clinical...

Impaired lung function, respiratory muscle weakness and exercise intolerance are present in COPD and contribute to poor prognosis. However, the contribution of the combination of these manifestations to define prognosis in COPD is still unknown. This study aimed to define cut-off points for both inspiratory and expiratory muscle strength (MIP and M...

Background Cardiac rehabilitation (CR) is a multicomponent intervention to reduce adverse outcomes from coronary artery disease, but its mechanisms are not fully understood. The aims of this study were to examine the impact of CR on survival and cardiovascular risk factors, and to determine potential mediators between CR attendance and reduced mort...

Background: A high minute ventilation/rate of carbon dioxide production (V̇ E /V̇CO 2 ) slope during exercise (i.e., ventilatory ineffciency) is more common in patients with cardiovascular disease and is prognostic of cardiovascular mortality. Interestingly, recent data in adults with obesity suggest that V̇ E /V̇CO 2 slopes are lower with higher b...

Background: Ventilatory ineffciency (high minute ventilation/rate of carbon dioxide production [V̇ E /V̇CO 2 ] slope) during exercise is more common in patients with metabolic syndrome and cardiovascular disease, and is prognostic of cardiovascular mortality. Interestingly, new data suggest that adults with controlled or untreated, but not uncontro...

BACKGROUND: Cardiorespiratory fitness (CRF), measured by peak oxygen uptake (VO2peak), is a strong predictor of mortality. Despite its widespread clinical use, current reference equations for VO2peak show distorted calibration in obese individuals. Using data from the Fitness Registry and the Importance of Exercise National Database (FRIEND), we so...

The six-minute step test (6MST) has been shown to be effective in assessing exercise capacity in individuals with COPD regardless of severity and, despite its easy execution, accessibility and validity, information on the prognostic power of this test remains uncertain. The aim of this study is to investigate whether the 6MST can predict the occurr...

Cardiorespiratory fitness (CRF), heavily influenced by physical activity (PA), represents a strong and independent risk factor for a wide range of health conditions, most notably, cardiovascular disease. Substantial disparities in CRF have been identified between white and non-white populations. These disparities may partly account for group differ...

Background Insufficient sleep can increase the risk of health problems and chronic conditions including cognitive problems, increased inflammation, diabetes and cardiovascular disease, and overall mortality. In this report, insufficient sleep, as a cultural experience, was tracked across the United States according to the American Nations model of...

While the majority of individuals with coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) recover completely, a significant percentage experience persistent symptom, which has been characterized as Long COVID and may be associated with cardiac and autonomic dysfunction. We evaluated heart rate variability (HRV) at rest and during deep-breathing (M-RSA) in patient...

Introduction An adequate level of cardiorespiratory fitness (CRF) is critical for firefighters to perform the strenuous and physiologically demanding work of firefighting safely and effectively. The coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) has been shown to negatively impact CRF in both the acute phase and longer-term following infection. This study aim...

Background ST segment elevation myocardial infarction (STEMI) elicits an intense inflammatory response which is thought to contribute to subsequent maladaptive myocardial healing and remodeling, ultimately leading to heart failure (HF). The interleukin-1 (IL-1) blocker anakinra administered during the first 14 days after STEMI patients has been sho...

Background Patients with heart failure with preserved ejection fraction (HFpEF) are a heterogeneous clinical population and might respond differently to pharmacologic therapies based on their baseline left ventricular EF (LVEF) (50-59% vs. ≥60%). Interleukin-1 (IL-1) is a key pro-inflammatory cytokine being explored as a therapeutic target in HFpEF...

Spanning several decades, numerous studies have emphasized the critical roles of physical activity (PA), exercise training (ET) and, especially, cardiorespiratory fitness (CRF) in the primary and secondary prevention of cardiovascular diseases (CVD), including coronary heart disease (CHD) and heart failure (HF) [1–3]. More recently, studies have al...

Heart failure (HF) is a complex syndrome that remains a leading cause of morbidity and mortality worldwide. Abundant evidence suggests inflammation plays a key role in the development and perpetuation of HF, but there are currently no anti-inflammatory treatments approved for use in HF. Interleukin-1 (IL-1), the prototypical pro-inflammatory cytoki...

The physical inactivity (PI) and obesity pandemics in the United States (U.S.) have undauntingly persisted in recent history. We have previously demonstrated differences in PI, obesity, socioeconomics, race, and regional culture according to county-level results for the 2020 presidential election. This commentary extends this analysis by considerin...

Purpose of review: Cardiopulmonary exercise testing (CPET) is the gold standard for directly assessing cardiorespiratory fitness (CRF) and has a relatively new and evolving role in evaluating atherosclerotic heart disease, particularly in detecting cardiac dysfunction caused by ischemic heart disease. The purpose of this review is to assess the cu...

Efforts to reverse the physical inactivity (PI) and obesity pandemics in the United States (U.S.) have been unsuccessful. This commentary provides a view of PI and obesity in the U.S. from the intersection of politics, socioeconomics, race, and culture. On a national level, counties where the Democratic candidate received more votes compared to the...

This review emphasizes the importance of cardiopulmonary exercise testing (CPET) in patients diagnosed with hypertrophic cardiomyopathy (HCM). In contrast to standard exercise testing and stress echoes, which are limited due to the ECG changes and wall motion abnormalities that characterize this condition, CPET allows for the assessment of the comp...

Abstract Background Patients treated for hematologic malignancy often experience reduced exercise capacity and increased fatigue; however whether this reduction is related to cardiac dysfunction or impairment of skeletal muscle oxygen extraction during activity is unknown. Cardiopulmonary exercise testing (CPET) coupled with stress cardiac magnetic...

Aims: Interleukin-1 (IL-1) blockade may improve exercise capacity in patients with heart failure (HF) patients. The extent of the improvement and its persistence beyond discontinuation of IL-1 blockade is unknown. Methods and results: The primary objective was to determine changes in cardiorespiratory fitness and cardiac function on-treatment wi...

Objective: This study aims to investigate the ability of the six-minute walk distance (6MWD) as a prognostic marker for midterm clinical outcomes three months after coronary artery bypass grafting (CABG), to identify possible predictors of fall in 6MWD in the early postoperative period, and to establish the percentage fall in early postoperative 6...

Background: Weber classification stratifies cardiac patients based on peak oxygen consumption (V̇O2), the gold-standard measure of exercise capacity. Objective: To determine if Weber classification is a useful tool to discriminate clinical phenotypes in COPD patients and to evaluate if disease severity and other clinical measures can predict V̇O...

While the majority of individuals with coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) recovercompletely, a significant percentage experience persistent symptoms, which has beencharacterized as Long COVID and may be associated with cardiac and autonomicdysfunction. We evaluated heart rate variability (HRV) at rest and during deep-breathing(M-RSA) in patients w...

Purpose: To describe the relationship between mortality and measures of low intensity physical activity (LIPA) as well as sedentary behavior (SB), and cardiorespiratory fitness (CRF). Methods: Study selection was performed through multiple database searches from 1/1/2000 until 5/1/2023. Seven LIPA studies, 9 SB studies, and 8 studies CRF studies...

Background: Exercise oscillatory ventilation (EOV) is considered an important variable for predicting poor prognosis in patients with heart failure (HF) with reduced left ventricular ejection fraction (HFrEF). However, there are no studies evaluating EOV presence in the coexistence chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) and HFrEF. Aims: I)...

Chronic disease pandemics have challenged societies and public health throughout history and remain ever-present. Despite increased knowledge, awareness and advancements in medicine, technology, and global initiatives the state of global health is declining. The coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic has compounded the current perilous state...

Cardiovascular (CV) disease (CVD) is the leading cause of global morbidity and mortality, and low levels of physical activity (PA) is a leading independent predictor of poor CV health and associated with an increased prevalence of risk factors that predispose to CVD development. In this review, we evaluate the benefits of exercise on CV health. We...

This article underscores the critical role of the health sector in promoting inclusive democratic practices and outlines several action steps that are necessary to strengthen civic and voter participation to advance health equity and population health outcomes.

The economic and social impact that coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) can bring is undeniable since high numbers of active workers in production and service provision are being contaminated. In addition, those infected may have long-term sequelae, impairing their functional capacity, and consequently, their work activities. It considers that inte...

Cardiovascular disease (CVD) is the leading non-communicable disease and cause of premature mortality globally. Despite well-established evidence of a cause-effect relationship between modifiable lifestyle behaviours and the onset of risk of chronic disease, preventative approaches to curtail increasing prevalence have been ineffective. This has un...

Purpose: Maximal heart rate (HRmax) continues to be an important measure of adequate effort during an exercise test. The aim of this study was to improve the accuracy of HRmax prediction using a machine learning (ML) approach. Methods: We used a sample from the Fitness Registry of the Importance of Exercise National Database, which included 17 3...