Chagas heart disease (HD) is a chronic fibrosing myocarditis with high mortality. The PEACH study aimed to evaluate if exercise training can improve the functional capacity of Chagas HD patients with left ventricular dysfunction and/or heart failure. The PEACH study was a single center, parallel-group, clinical trial that randomized 30 clinical stable Chagas HD patients with left ventricular ejection fraction < 45% or heart failure symptoms to either supervised exercise training 3 times/week for 6 months or a control group. Both groups had the same monthly pharmaceutical and nutritional counseling and usual care. Primary end point was functional capacity assessed by peak exercise oxygen consumption (peak VO2) obtained by cardiopulmonary exercise test. Secondary end points included other cardiopulmonary exercise test variables, cardiac function by echocardiography, body composition, muscle respiratory strength, and metabolic biomarkers. Peak VO2 increased among patients in exercise group from 17.60 +/- 4.65 mlO2/kg/min to 19.40 +/- 5.51 mlO2/kg/min while decreased in controls from 15.40 +/- 6.30 mlO2 kg-1 min-1 to 12.96 +/- 4.50 mlO2 /kg/min, resulting in significant difference in change in peak VO2 between groups after 6 months (beta +4.6, p = 0.004). There were significant differences between groups in changes in anaerobic threshold (beta 3.7, p = 0.05), peak oxygen pulse (beta +2.7, p = 0.032) and maximum minute ventilation (beta +13.9, p < 0.0001) after 6 months of intervention. In conclusion, exercise training improved functional capacity of chronic Chagas HD patients with left ventricular dysfunction and/or heart failure.
With permission from Excerpta Medica Inc.

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