Improvement of metabolic and cardiorespiratory responses through treadmill gait training with neuromuscular electrical stimulation in quadriplegic subjects

This work assessed the influence of treadmill gait training with neuromuscular electrical stimulation (NMES) on the metabolic and cardiorespiratory responses in quadriplegic subjects. The gait group (GG) (n = 11) performed 6 months of treadmill training with 30-50% body weight support and with the help of physiotherapists, twice a week, allotting 20 min for each session. The control group (CG) (n = 10), during the 6 months of training, did not perform any activity using NMES, performing instead conventional physiotherapy. Metabolic and cardiorespiratory responses (O-2 uptake [VO2], CO2 production [VCO2], pulmonary ventilation (V-E), heart rate [HR], and blood pressure [BP]) were measured on inclusion and after 6 months. For the GG, differences were found in all parameters after training (P < 0.05), except for HR and diastolic BP. During gait, VO2 (L/min) increased by 36%, VCO2 (L/min) increased by 42.97%, V-E (L/min) increased by 30.48%, and systolic BP (mm Hg) increased by 4.8%. For the CG, only VO2 and VCO2 (L/min) significantly increased at rest (30.82 and 16.39%, respectively) and during knee-extension exercise (26.29 and 17.37%, respectively). Treadmill gait with NMES was, therefore, more efficient toward increasing the aerobic capacity due to yielding higher metabolic and cardiovascular stresses.