Guideline for the application of heart rate and heart rate variability in occupational medicine and occupational health science

Abstract

This updated guideline replaces the "Guideline for the application of heart rate and heart rate variability in occupational medicine and occupational health science" first published in 2014. Based on the older version of the guideline, the authors have reviewed and evaluated the findings on the use of heart rate (HR) and heart rate variability (HRV) that have been published in the meantime and incorporated them into a new version of this guideline.This guideline was developed for application in clinical practice and research purposes in the fields of occupational medicine and occupational science to complement evaluation procedures with respect to exposure and risk assessment at the workplace by the use of objective physiological workload indicators. In addition, HRV is also suitable for assessing the state of health and for monitoring the progress of illnesses and preventive medical measures. It gives an overview of factors influencing the regulation of the HR and HRV at rest and during work. It further illustrates methods for measuring and analyzing these parameters under standardized laboratory and real workload conditions, areas of application as well as the quality control procedures to be followed during the recording and evaluation of HR and HRV.

Keywords: Autonomous nervous system; Parasympathetic nervous system; Strain; Stress; Sympathetic nervous system.

Fig. 1

Principle of determining the NN intervals from the ECG as a measure of the distance between two R-spikes

Fig. 2

Principle of selecting a suitable 5-min range of the NN measurement from an artifact-superimposed recording with an early non-stationary range

Fig. 3

Overview of the possibilities of HRV analysis with examples of possible graphical representations

Fig. 4

Grouping of the different factors influencing HRV into four main areas (modified taken from [216]).  * = HRV reduction as a result of the physiological response to the physical stimulus.

Fig. 5

Heartrate during different loads (below or above the CPL as well as in the range of the CPL) with respective recoveries, schematic representation, modified according to Müller [14], CPL = continuous performance limit