Introduction: More and more patients survive myocardial infarction due to the progress in acute management. Secondary prevention carried out in cardiac rehabilitation programs plays an important role in the improvement of the quality of life and risk management in these patients. The key component of cardiac rehabilitation is exercise training, as improvement of the aerobic capacity leads to a reduction of mortality. Due to its effectiveness in healthy populations, high intensity interval training is being increasingly used in cardiac rehabilitation setting, although its effectiveness and safety have not yet been researched enough. Purpose: To compare the effectiveness of high intensity interval training and continuous training for improvement of the aerobic and working capacities, cardiac autonomic function and quality of life in patients after acute myocardial infarction. To record adverse events and infer about the safety of training modalities. Methods: 45 patients were included and randomly assigned to either the high intensity interval training group or the continuous one. They all carried out 36 training sessions. Before and after the training program, a cardiac stress test was performed to obtain the data about peak oxygen uptake, oxygen uptake at the anaerobic threshold and maximal power output. After the test had been finished, heart rate reduction was recorded. The Heart QOL questionnaire was filled in by the participants before and after the interventon. All the adverse events were recorded. Results: There was statistically significant improvement of aerobic capacity, power output and quality of life in both training groups. There were no significant differences between the groups. Oxygen uptake and heart rate recovery in the first minute remained unchanged in both groups. Heart rate recovery in the third minute improved in the continuous training group. The difference between the groups was not statistically significant. No cardiovascular adverse events occurred during or immediately after training. Conclusions: Similar improvement of both training groups can be attributed to an individual adjustment of training intensity to the patients’ abilities. Therefore, both groups trained at similar mean intensities. Both training protocols seem safe, but the question remains whether high intensity interval training is suitable for all patient groups entering cardiac rehabilitation.
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