Supervised exercise therapy for intermittent claudication

Purpose of the review : Although exercise therapy is considered to be of significant benefit to people with intermittent claudication, almost half of those affected do not undertake any exercise therapy. The purpose of this review is to evaluate the effects of supervised exercise therapy (SET) for people with intermittent claudication. Materials and methods : SET will be compared with non-supervised exercise therapy programs and the superiority of SET will be demonstrated. The development and implementation of a new community-based concept of SET will be addressed, whereas the first results of this new concept will be presented and compared with the results of SET programs provided in clinical settings, as described in literature. Main results : SET programs have significant benefits compared with non-supervised programs. Community-based SET has both economic and logistic advantages over clinic-based SET. Furthermore, community-based SET programs seems to be as effective as SET provided in a clinic-based setting and is a promising approach to providing conservative treatment for patients with intermittent claudication. Conclusions : SET in a community-based setting should ideally be the initial standard of care for patients with intermittent claudication. However, a study of the cost-effectiveness should be awaited.