Fitkids Treadmill Test: Age- and Sex-Related Normative Values in Dutch Children and Adolescents.

BACKGROUND: Recent research has shown that the Fitkids Treadmill Test (FTT) is a valid and reproducible exercise test for the assessment of aerobic exercise capacity in children and adolescents who are healthy.

OBJECTIVE: The study objective was to provide sex- and age-related normative values for FTT performance in children and adolescents who were healthy, developing typically, and 6 to 18 years of age.

DESIGN: This was a cross-sectional, observational study.

METHODS: Three hundred fifty-six children and adolescents who were healthy (174 boys and 182 girls; mean age=12.9 years, SD=3.7) performed the FTT to their maximal effort to assess time to exhaustion (TTE). The least-mean-square method was used to generate sex- and age-related centile charts (P3, P10, P25, P50, P75, P90, and P97) for TTE on the FTT.

RESULTS: In boys, the reference curve (P50) showed an almost linear increase in TTE with age, from 8.8 minutes at 6 years of age to 16.1 minutes at 18 years of age. In girls, the P50 values for TTE increased from 8.8 minutes at 6 years of age to 12.5 minutes at 18 years of age, with a plateau in TTE starting at approximately 10 years of age.

LIMITATIONS: Youth who were not white were underrepresented in this study.

CONCLUSIONS: This study describes sex- and age-related normative values for FTT performance in children and adolescents who were healthy, developing typically, and 6 to 18 years of age. These age- and sex-related normative values will increase the usefulness of the FTT in clinical practice.