Préconditionnement ischémique et exercice : de la réadaptation à la performance

Physical activity is an integral part of medical recommendations for preventing and treating coronary heart disease. By following a structured training program, is it possible to improve response to exercise and provide heart protection at the same time? This is suggested by certain studies on ischemic preconditioning (IPC) induced by a maximal exercise test. The same physiological mechanisms induced by IPC are also observed when a pressure cuff is used to create cycles of ischemia/reperfusion on skeletal muscle. This is known as remote ischemic preconditioning (RIPC). At the other end of the physical activity spectrum, athletes have used RIPC during warm-ups to improve performance. The following research projects were developed to study these premises. The first trial addressed the effects of RIPC on short supra-maximal exercise. The subjects (N = 16) performed an alactic test (six seconds of supra-maximal exercise) followed by a lactic test (30 seconds of supra-maximal exercise) on a cycle ergometer. The subjects were randomly assigned to an RIPC or CON intervention before the exercise. The RIPC procedure involved four cycles of ischemia using a pressure cuff inflated to 50 mmHg above systolic blood pressure at the arm. The results of the project show that RIPC intervention does not significantly improve performance typical of the anaerobic system, despite a slight increase in maximal power output in favour of RIPC in the 30 second Wingate test (795 W vs. 777 W)  and in the 6 seconds test (856 W vs. 847 W).  The aim of the second clinical trial was to study the effects of RIPC during eight minutes of moderate exercise (75% of ventilatory threshold) and intense exercise (115% of ventilatory threshold) on the kinetics of O2 uptake. Our results showed a significant acceleration in the kinetics of O2 uptake during the RIPC intervention compared to the CON intervention for the two exercise intensities (value of 1 during moderate exercise: 27.2 ± 4.6 seconds compared with 33.7 ± 6.2, p < .01 and intense exercise: 299 ± 4.9 seconds compared with 33.5 ± 4.1, p < .001) in amateur athletes (N= 15). This means a reduction in the oxygen deficit at the onset of exercise and more rapid achievement of the steady state.  The third project involved performing a systematic review and meta-analysis on ischemic preconditioning (IPC) induced by an exercise test in coronary patients. Our literature search identified 309 articles, 34 of which were included in the meta-analysis, which represents a batch of 1,053 patients. Our statistical analyses show that in subsequent exercise, patients' time to 1 mm ST segment depression is augmented by 91 seconds (p < .001); the maximum depression decreases by 0.38 mm (p < .01); the double product at 1 mm ST segment depression increases by 1.80 x 103 mmHg (p < .001) and the total time of exercise increases by 50 seconds (p < .001).   Our research projects have promoted the advancement of knowledge in exercise science by the use of a cuff as a stimulus to the RIPC before sports performance. We evaluated the effect of the RIPC on different metabolic pathways and we concluded that the method could accelerate the kinetics of oxygen consumption and reduce the range of oxygen deficit. In addition, we have established clinical parameters for assessing the IPC induced by a stress test for coronary patients.

Keyphrases: Ischemic preconditioning, Remote ischemic preconditioning, Oxygen uptake kinetics, Wingate test, Meta-analysis