Background: Haemophilia is a congenital bleeding disorder going along with disease-specific joint complications and general health implications attributed to the lack of daily movement. Recent guidelines recommend physical activity for people with haemophilia (PwH). Yet, aerobic exercise in PwH is little studied and seldomly prescribed by clinicans.
Aim: The aim of this systematic review is to investigate the safety, feasibility and health-related efficiency of AE in PwH.
Methods: A systematic literature search according to the PRISMA guidelines was conducted (PubMed, Web of Science). Inclusion criteria were defined using PICOS. Methodological quality was assessed via TESTEX.
Results: Out of 789 studies identified, seven studies (three randomized controlled, two controlled, two single-group prospective trails) were included. The TESTEX mean score was 8.1 (±3.8). AE was realized as aquatic exercise, nordic walking, treadmill running, bicycle riding and swimming. Neither bleeding rates nor the factor amount increased and AE led to diverse health-related improvements.
Conclusions: Little research has been conducted evaluating AE in PwH. Yet, AE can be considered as safe and feasible when being supervised by experts. However, disease-specific recommendations for AE are difficult to provide. Therefore, experts can currently only back AE recommendations on experience and nonhaemophilia-specific general guidelines.
Keywords: bleeding disorder; endurance training; haemophilic arthropathy; physical activity; rare disease; sports participation.
© 2022 The Authors. Haemophilia published by John Wiley & Sons Ltd.