Abstract
As a preliminary to a new form of exercise treatment for cardiac insufficiency which we have described elsewhere, we investigated the test of the heart's functional capacity described by Graüpner. The essential features of his test are the deductions made from the form of the curve of the systolic blood-pressure after measured amounts of work. Although we were unable to confirm his most important results, we believe that the method of making frequent readings of the pulse-rate and systolic pressure after measured amounts of work furnishes the key to this problem of determining the heart's efficiency.
Our work may be divided into two parts. The first consisted in experiments on 23 normal persons. In three persons the graduated work was performed by means of a bicycle ergometer of the type described by Krogh and Lindhard, 1 and in 20 persons by means of dumb-bell and bar movements.
The second part comprised experiments on 32 patients suffering from cardiac insufficiency. The ergometer was used in two patients, and dumb-bell work in the remaining 30.
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