The Importance of Including Co-Factor Information when Reporting Resting Heart Rate

Resting heart rate, sometimes referred to as resting pulse rate (RPR) is taken for various reasons in the various health care professions. As with many physiological tests, there are a number of basic factors that can affect RPR, such as gender and position of the patient during measurement. In most papers, these basic factors are included but in some they are not. If such information is lacking, the meaningfulness of the reported RPR is diminished. The purpose of this manuscript is to highlight the importance of including such information when reporting on RPR data.