Advisor

Gary Brodowicz

Date of Award

12-23-1997

Document Type

Thesis

Degree Name

Master of Science (M.S.) in Health Studies

Department

Community Health

Physical Description

1 online resource, ( 89p.)

Subjects

Plethysmography, Physical fitness -- Testing

DOI

10.15760/etd.7247

Abstract

Plethysmography is a technique used for measuring alterations in the volume of organs or limbs. Japanese researchers have developed a relatively new application of plethysmography (accelerated plethysmography) that uses information from the pulse wave measured at the fingertip to make inferences about health and fitness status. The instrument used to collect data -- the Precaregraph (accelerated plethysmograph) -- provides an accelerated pulse waveform and and APG index, a mathematical representation of the waveform. It was the purpose of this study to evaluate the validity of the Precaregraph by examining the relationship between the APG index and previously validated measures of health and fitness status.

Forty-three individuals volunteered for participation. Blood pressure, resting heart rate, weekly physical activity level, estimated V̇02max, cardiovascular disease risk, body composition and APG index were measured.

The APG index demonstrated acceptable reliability in the pilot study (R=.999). In the principal investigation, the only measures related to the APG index were age (r=-.780), V̇02max (r=.709), and weekly physical activity level (r=.328). No significant correlations were found between any other variables. Correlations with the same independent variables were found when subjects were dichotomized into older and younger groups and high-fit and low-fit groups.

It was concluded that the Precaregraph may be a useful instrument for evaluating fitness status, but its efficacy for evaluating health or disease remains to be determined. Further studies are needed to gather additional data to confirm these results.

Description

If you are the rightful copyright holder of this dissertation or thesis and wish to have it removed from the Open Access Collection, please submit a request to pdxscholar@pdx.edu and include clear identification of the work, preferably with URL.

Persistent Identifier

https://archives.pdx.edu/ds/psu/30827

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