Programme Designs

• • The big advantage with the circuit design is that it offers a variety of exercises which allows participants to adopt the interval or continuous approach and can accommodate individuals’ needs and abilities and allow them to progress at their own rate
  • This is essential in order to accommodate participants with different levels of risk stratification and abilities
  • Depending on the level of the participant they perform different duration of continuous aerobic exercise before spending time in active recovery, noting that feet must be kept moving so as to aid venous return
  • Movement of the toes or contraction of the calf muscles will also contribute to venous return

  
• • Gym based cardiovascular exercise is another alternative for an exercise programme and can be offered as a group or individualised session
  • The individual spends a predetermined time on each machine somewhere between 4 – 10 minutes
  • This allows for adequate time in moving between machines and provides exercise variety
  • An interval approach can be adopted in the gym and can be achieved by using free weights for strength and resistance exercises or by increasing the intensity on a particular piece of cardiovascular equipment, for example cycling at 5 mph for 1 minute followed by 1 minute at 3 mph
  • Muscle strength and endurance exercise (MSE) using resistance machines can be performed after the conditioning component and cool down so as to avoid any significant drop in heart rate

  
• Home Exercise:

  • Individuals should also be encouraged to become responsible for their own physical activity and health
  • Building an individuals’ confidence will help towards exercising independently in unsupervised activities
  • The home programme should be individualised, safe, effective and progressive
  • Consideration should also be given to:
  • Individuals values and beliefs
  • Habitual activity
  • Barriers
  • Goal setting
  • Past and present activities
  • RPE and monitoring intensity
  • Activity diaries
  • The home exercise programme can take a number of formats:
  • Walking programme
  • Home circuit
  • Other structured exercise
  • Activities of daily living
  • A combination of the above