3. PROTOCOL
The Cardiovascular Fitness component is composed of two sections. The first section willinclude shared exclusion questions and blood pressure measurement. The second section will include the
preparation and performance of the treadmill test. In addition, some SPs will be excluded by medication
review and/or review of shared exclusions asked in the Physician’s exam.
3.1 Exclusions to the CV Fitness Component
SPs are excluded from the Cardiovascular Fitness component based on selected medicalhistory, medications, physical limitations, and edit limits on heart rate, blood pressure, and irregular beats.
These exclusions will be determined from several sources. Physical limitations and other safety
exclusions are determined as part of the Shared Exclusion questions asked in several components. Review
of medications and medical exclusions are determined based on questions asked in the Household
Interview and then subsequently reviewed by the MEC physician. Measurements of heart rate, blood
pressure and irregular beats are determined as part of the Blood Pressure section in the Physician’s Exam
or in Section 1 of the CV Fitness Exam. The procedures for each of these exclusions are outlined below.
3.1.1 Shared Exclusion Questions
Shared exclusion questions are safety exclusions that are shared with other components inthe MEC. These questions are asked only once in the MEC and if they have been asked in a previous
component, the questions and responses will be displayed in read-only format in subsequent components.
A response that indicates an exclusion to one or more components will send a flag to the Coordinator
System and the SP will be blocked from the appropriate components. The shared exclusion questions that
block SPs from CV Fitness are listed below:
- Do you have any amputations of your legs and feet other than toes? Where is the
amputation? - How much do you weigh without clothes or shoes?
- Do you have a pacemaker or automatic defibrillator?