Table 3.
Outcome measurements of each study
| First author, year | Type of analyses | SDNN (ms) | RMSSD (ms) | TP (ms2) |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| May, [47] | Difference in maternal HRV between exercise and control group at gw28, gw32, and gw36 | maternal gw28: exercise: 53.9 ± 27.4 control: 38.7 ± 12.9 (p = 0.01) |
maternal gw28: exercise: 40.2 ± 34.1 control 25.9 ± 13.5 (p = 0.05)d |
--- |
| gw32: exercise: 53.0 ± 19.8 control: 38.1 ± 13.7 (p = 0.002) |
gw32: exercise: 32.7 ± 24.9 control: 22.9 ± 11.7 (n.s.) |
|||
| gw36: exercise: 55.8 ± 20.6 control: 44.6 ± 14.0 (p = 0.03) |
gw36: exercise: 32.4 ± 24.9 control: 21.3 ± 11.2 (p = 0.05)d |
|||
| Van Leeuwen, [41] | Examining the occurrence of fetal-maternal heart rate synchronization in which the mothers were either exercising regularly or were sedentary | maternal exercise: 57.6 ± 22.2 control: 44.9 ± 12.5 (n.s.) |
maternal exercise: 35.2 ± 26.9 control: 20.8 ± 9.1 (n.s.) |
--- |
| fetal exercise: 29.3 ± 9.6 control: 21.4 ± 6.2 (p = 0.01) |
fetal exercise: 8.6 ± 3.8 control: 6.2 ± 2.1 (p = 0.02) |
|||
| May, Suminski, [37] | Correlation between continuous and non-continuous maternal LTPA and fetal HRV | fetal continuous LTPA R = 0.38 (p < 0.05) |
fetal continuous LTPA R = 0.31 (n.s.) |
--- |
| non-continuous LTPA R = 0.33 (p < 0.05) |
non-continuous LTPA R = 0.04 (n.s.) |
|||
| May, Scholtz, [39] | Difference in infant HRV between exercise and control group | infant exercise: 38.8 ± 10.8 control: 34.8 ± 14.6 (n.s.) |
infanta
exercise: 1.03 ± 0.14 control: 0.87 ± 0.21 (p = 0.01) |
--- |
| Gustafson, [42] | Difference in fetal HRV between exercise and control group adjusted for fetal breathing | --- | fetala
estimate: 0.34; SE: 0.14 (n.s.) |
fetala
estimate: 1.06; SE: 0.36 (n.s.) |
| May, [38] | Correlation between maternal LTPA (intensity, duration) and fetal HRV Regression to predict fetal heart measures |
fetal intensityb R = 0.28 (p < 0.05) |
fetal intensityb R = 0.27 (n.s.) |
--- |
| durationc
R = 0.44 (p < 0.005) |
durationc
R = 0.39 (p < 0.01) |
|||
| positively predicted by intensity (p = 0.033) | positively predicted by duration (p = 0.005) | |||
| Stutzman [43] | Within and between group changes from pre (gw20) to post (gw36) for each of the four groups; results are only presented for the HRV outcomes measured in supine position | --- | --- | maternal exercise – NW: gw20: 777.1 ± 1072 gw36: 787.8 ± 1042 (n.s.) |
| exercise – OaO: gw20: 523.2 ± 621 gw36: 231.9 ± 203.5 (n.s.) | ||||
| control – NW: gw20: 746.3 ± 667 gw36: 461.3 ± 583 (n.s.) | ||||
| control – OaO: gw20: 652.1 ± 984 gw36: 326.1 ± 506 (sig.)* | ||||
| May, [40] | Changes in fetal HRV between exercise and control groups depending on fetal state (active vs. passive) at gw28, gw32, and gw36 | fetala,e
gw28: exercise: 3.1 ± 0.3 control 2.9 ± 0.2 (n.s.) |
fetala,e
gw28: exercise: 1.8 ± 0.3 control 1.6 ± 0.3 (n.s.) |
--- |
| gw32: exercise: 3.2 ± 0.3 control: 3.1 ± 0.3 (n.s.) |
gw32: exercise: 1.8 ± 0.3 control: 1.6 ± 0.3 (n.s.) |
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| gw36: exercise: 3.4 ± 0.3 control: 3.1 ± 0.3 (p = 0.03) |
gw36: exercise: 2.0 ± 0.5 control: 1.7 ± 0.3 (p = 0.03) |
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| Satyapriya [36] | Changes in maternal HRV pre and during exercise session and pre and post exercise session (acute effects) at gw20 and gw36 (effects over time) Important: differences between maternal HRV measurements at gw20 and gw36 (effects over time) were not reported to be tested for significance |
--- | --- | --- |
(F fetal, gw gestational week, HRV heart rate variability, LTPA leisure-time physical activity, M maternal, ms millisecond, NW normal weight; n.s not significant, OaO overweight and obese, RMSSD root mean square of successive difference, SE standard error, sig significant, SDNN standard deviation of normal-to-normal intervals, TP total power)
*p-values were not provided
adata were log transformed to fulfill Gaussian distribution
bkcal · min−1
cminutes during third trimester
dlevel of significance was defined as p ≤ 0.05 for all analyzes performed by Van Leeuwen et al. [41]
emeasurements are only presented for active fetal state. Note that sample size is reduced at all time points (GA weeks 28 (n = 39), 32 (n = 37), 36 (N = 29)); results for quiet fetal state are not presented in this table because sample size is very small in this group