Revascularization before exercise program improves walking for patients with PAD

Intermittent claudication is the classic symptomatic form of peripheral artery disease (PAD), affecting approximately 20 to 40 million people worldwide and increasing rapidly with the aging world population. Patients with claudication experience significant functional disability often resulting in a sedentary lifestyle and reduced quality of life. Supervised exercise is recommended as a first-line treatment. A combination therapy of endovascular revascularization plus supervised exercise may be beneficial, but few data comparing the two therapies are available, according to background information in the article.

M.G. Myriam Hunink, M.D., Ph.D., of the Erasmus University Medical Center, Rotterdam, the Netherlands, and colleagues randomly assigned 212 patients with PAD and intermittent claudication to endovascular revascularization plus supervised exercise (n = 106) or supervised exercise only (n = 106). The primary measured outcome for the study was the difference in maximum treadmill walking distance at 12 months between the groups.

The researchers found that endovascular revascularization plus supervised exercise (combination therapy) was associated with greater improvement in maximum walking distance compared with the supervised exercise only group, and in pain-free walking distance. Also, the combination therapy group demonstrated significantly greater improvement in health-related quality-of-life.

"The present study reopens the debate for revascularization in patients with claudication, in particular in terms of an approach using endovascular revascularization first. By improving lower extremity blood flow, early percutaneous revascularization of the target lesion gives an impulse to patient mobility and quality of life in the short-term. This, in turn, facilitates subsequent exercising and allows the patient to profit from the long-term benefits of an additional supervised exercise program," the authors write.