Barcelona rolls out the red carpet for six-minute walk test

"Now I understand even better what this test means for my patients." This was the statement the team from Würzburg heard most frequently after cardiologists from all over the world completed the six-minute walk test at this year's European Heart Failure Congress in Barcelona.

Reference values and calculator help with the interpretation of the walking test

The six-minute walk test (6MWT) is an established method for testing the performance of people with heart failure and lung disease. It measures the distance the patient covers in six minutes.

A new feature is the calculator developed by the German Centre for Heart Failure (DZHI) at Würzburg University Hospital together with the Institute of Clinical Epidemiology and Biometry (ICE-B). This helps with the interpretation of the test results. Once the distance covered on the 15 metre test track, the age and height have been entered into the calculator, it displays the individual's performance in relation to the normal population. The reference values come from a large sample from the city of Würzburg, the so-called STAAB cohort.

Twelve walking distances for the six-minute walk test

The Heart Failure Association (HFA) of the European Society of Cardiology (ESC) offered the researchers the opportunity to test the 6MWT app developed by IKE-B and the Health Study Club (HSC) at the congress. The red carpet was laid out for them on twelve walking routes.

"The response was overwhelming," says a delighted Professor Caroline Morbach. The cardiologist from the DZHI created the standard values together with Professor Stefan Störk and had the idea of offering the test at the congress. A total of 237 walking tests were successfully carried out. People between the ages of nine and 69 from 44 countries took part. The total distance covered was 135.8 kilometres and the number of steps was 169,633.

Live ranking of the fittest congress participants

The live dashboard developed by the HSC showed which countries the fittest congress participants came from. The leader among the women was a 41-year-old French woman who walked 884.6 metres in six minutes, 49 percent above the STAAB reference value. In the men's competition, a 64-year-old Slovenian came first with 790.4 metres, 39 per cent above the value. This meant that France and Slovenia also led the national competition, followed by Serbia, Iceland and Ecuador. Germany finished in ninth place.

In terms of pure distance, Germany took first place in the men's competition with 842.5 metres covered. France won the women's individual classification with 884.6 metres covered. In the national category, however, Saudi Arabia took first place with 876.9 metres, as only a single "walker" competed here and the average counted. In total, an average of 608 metres and 757 steps were covered in six minutes in Barcelona.

Data collected for the further development of the app

"We were particularly pleased about the great interest in using the test at other international conferences in the future. In addition to raising awareness of the 6MWT, we were also able to collect valuable data to further improve the app and optimise it for wider use," says Professor Rüdiger Pryss, holder of the Chair of Medical Data Science at IKE-B.

In the hands-on programme at "Wir bewegen Bayern" and "Nürnberg Digital Festival"

Incidentally, the six-minute walk test is also part of the hands-on programme of "Wir bewegen Bayern", Bavaria's largest prevention event against cancer. The team will be on hand on 13 June from 10.30 am to 3.30 pm in the outdoor area of the University of Würzburg's sports centre (Unterer Hublandweg) to test visitors' fitness.

And on 30 June, participants in the Nuremberg Digital Festival will have the opportunity to put the 6MWT app and its performance to the test as part of the  "Guardians of your Health - digital health to try out" event.