Abstract

Assessing post-exercise cardiac autonomic recovery serves as a practical medical tool to gauge cardiovascular health. A diminished heart rate recovery, indicative of autonomic dysfunction, has been observed across a spectrum of cardiovascular conditions, correlating with heightened risks of cardiac and overall mortality. Consequently, in recent years, non-invasive methods for appraising cardiac autonomic recovery following exercise, based on either heart rate recovery or heart rate variability indices, have been proposed. However, for these techniques to be effectively integrated into routine clinical practice there is a need for more comprehensive discussions regarding their medical validity, physiological significance, mathematical formulations, and reproducibility.