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As COVID-19 cedes its pandemic-scale status to the past, its wake is revealing surprises and raising questions, particularly in relation to pulmonary medicine. The need for isolation at COVID’s outset kept many millions at home, creating conditions favorable for the rapid expansion of technologies that were taken up quickly in telehealth applications. The need was overwhelming. But just how effective telehealth actually is at replacing on-site programs for COPD pulmonary rehab has remained a research challenge, although results from early studies show unmistakable value. Creating conditions conducive to research into the strengths and weaknesses of pulmonary rehab, and determining how research can be applied effectively, remain formidable challenges.
Early studies of telehealth pulmonary rehabilitation have not uncovered any glaring erosion of pulmonary rehabilitation’s well-established benefits. But, at the same time, the relatively young field of pulmonary telerehabilitation for chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) has lacked coordinated efforts to determine its key practices and the instruments for measuring them, both basic elements for pursuing research questions.
A 2021 American Thoracic Society workshop report (AE Holland, https://doi.org/10.1513/AnnalsATS.202102-146ST) identified essential components of a pulmonary rehabilitation model through an online Delphi process involving about 50 international experts. Components ultimately included those with median scores of 2 or higher (strongly agree or agree that the item is essential) and high consensus (interquartile range, 0). Thirteen essential components fit into four categories (Patient Assessment, Program Components, Method of Delivery and Quality Assurance). The Patient Assessment category included seven items: (1) An initial center-based assessment by a health care professional, (2) An exercise test at the time of assessment, (3) A field exercise test, (4) Quality of life measure, (5) Dyspnea assessment, (6) Nutritional status evaluation, and (7) Occupational status evaluation. The Program Components: (8) Endurance training and (9) Resistance training). The Method of Delivery: (10) An exercise program that is individually prescribed, (11) An exercise program that is individually progressed, and (12) Team includes a health care professional with experience in exercise prescription and progression. The single Quality Assurance item: (13) Health care professionals are trained to deliver the components of the model that is deployed.
Cochrane Library review
2021 “Intervention Review” (“Telerehabilitation for chronic respiratory disease,” https://doi.org/10.1002/14651858.CD013040.pub2). Using their own databases (eg, Cochrane Airways Trials Register) and others, the authors included controlled trials published up to November 30, 2020 with at least 50% of the rehabilitation delivered by telerehabilitation. The authors’ analysis of 15 studies (with 32 reports) including 1904 participants (99% with COPD): “There was probably little or no difference between telerehabilitation and in-person pulmonary rehabilitation for exercise capacity measured as 6-Minute Walking Distance (mean difference 0.06 meters (m), 95% confidence interval (CI) -10.82 m to 10.94 m).” They reached the same conclusion for quality of life, and for breathlessness. Completion of rehabilitation programs, however, was more likely with telerehabilitation at 93% versus 70% for in-person rehabilitation. No adverse effects of telerehabilitation were observed over and above those for in-person or no rehabilitation. An obvious limitation of the findings is that the studies all pre-date COVID-19, which would have introduced very significant disincentives for in-person rehabilitation completion.
An older (2016) international randomized controlled study (Zanaboni et al, https://doi.org/10.1186/s12890-016-0288-z) comparing long-term telerehabilitation or unsupervised treadmill training at home with standard care included 120 participants with COPD and had 2-years of follow-up. Telerehabilitation consisted of individualized treadmill training at home. Participants had scheduled exercise sessions supervised by a physiotherapist via videoconferencing following a standardized protocol. Participants in the unsupervised training group were provided with a treadmill only to perform unsupervised exercise at home. They also received an exercise booklet, a paper exercise diary to record their training sessions, and an individualized training program but without regular review or progression of the program. For the primary outcomes of combined hospitalizations and emergency department presentations, incidence rate of hospitalizations and emergency department presentations was lower with telerehabilitation (1.18 events per person-year; 95% confidence interval [CI], 0.94–1.46) and with unsupervised training group (1.14; 95% CI, 0.92–1.41) than in the control group (1.88; 95% CI, 1.58–2.21; P < .001 compared with intervention groups). Both training groups had better health status at 1-year, and achieved and maintained clinically significant improvements in exercise capacity.
Access to pulmonary rehabilitation
Continuing evidence of clear telerehabilitation benefits is good news, especially in the light of impediments to attendance at in-clinic programs. Although the COVID-provoked disincentives have been diminishing, persisting access issues remain for substantial portions of eligible populations, according to a recent (2024) cross-sectional study (PA Kahn, WA Mathis, doi:10.1001/jamanetworkopen.2023.54867) looking at travel time to pulmonary rehabilitation programs as a marker for pulmonary rehabilitation access. The report, based on US Census designations (lower 48 states and Washington, D.C.) found that while 80.3% of the population lives in urban or suburban areas within a 30-minute drive of a pulmonary rehabilitation program, travel time exceeds that in rural and other sparsely populated areas with more than 14 million people residing in areas demanding more than 1-hour for travel. A further analysis showed also that nearly 30% of American Indian and Alaska Native populations live more than 60 minutes from a pulmonary rehabilitation program.
Aside from the obvious restraints for homebound patients or those lacking transportation or who need medical transport, other common impediments inhibit on-site pulmonary rehabilitation attendance, said Corinne Young, MSN, FNP-C, FCCP. Ms. Young is the director of Advance Practice Provider and Clinical Services for Colorado Springs Pulmonary Consultants, president and founder of the Association of Pulmonary Advance Practice Providers, and a member of the CHEST Physician Editorial Board. “I have some patients who say ‘There’s no way I could do onsite pulmonary rehab because of my knee — or back, or shoulder.’ But in their own home environment they may feel more comfortable. They may be willing to try new things at their own pace, whereas for them a program may feel too regimented.” For others, Ms. Young said, aspects of a formal program are a clear plus factor. “They love to hear their progress at the end of — say a 12-week program — where their virtual respiratory therapist records and reports to them their six-minute walk and other test results. Feedback is a great reinforcer.” Quality of life improvements, Ms. Young commented, were one of the very impressive benefits that appeared in the initial studies of pulmonary rehabilitation for COPD patients. “Being patient-centric, you want to improve quality of life for them as much as possible and we see telerehabilitation as a great opportunity for many,” she added.
“I would like to see head-to-head data on outpatient versus at-home pulmonary rehabilitation on hospitalizations, time to exacerbation and, of course, mortality. We have all that for outpatient rehab, but it would be great to be able to compare them. Knowing that would influence what we recommend, especially for patients who could go either way. Also, you have to assess their motivation and discipline to know who might be more appropriate for unsupervised pulmonary rehabilitation.”
The current reality for Ms. Young is that in her Colorado Springs vicinity, where both in-patient programs are only 15 minutes apart, she knows of no telerehabilitation programs being offered. While there are contract telerehabilitation providers, Young said, and her organization (The Association of Pulmonary Advanced Practice Providers) has been approached by one, none are licensed in Colorado, and telerehabilitation is not a billable service.
“As of yet, I’m not aware of any telemedicine pulmonary rehab available at our institution,” said pulmonologist Mary Jo S. Farmer, MD, PhD, FCCP, Associate Professor of Medicine at UMass Chan Medical School – Baystate, Springfield, MA, and a member of the CHEST Physician Editorial Board. A brief internet search identified a telerehabilitation contract provider available only in Arizona.
Reimbursement will also be a foundational concern, Ms. Young commented. While a physician, nurse practitioner, or physician virtual visit for education may be billable, telerehabilitation reimbursement is new territory. “How that all is going to work out is a big unknown piece,” she said.
Minimal components
Effective pulmonary telerehabilitation programs, Ms. Young said, need to provide exercise with an aerobic device, either a treadmill, a stationary bike or even a Cubii-type under desk foot pedal/elliptical machine, and some resistance training (elastic bands, or weights, for example). “But 50% of pulmonary rehabilitation is education about breathing techniques, purse-lip breathing, and pulmonary nutrition.” Also essential: one-on-one discussion with a qualified medical practitioner who checks on oximeter use, inhaler technique, and titrating oxygen therapy. “At our elevation of 6500 feet, most of our patients are on that.” Optimal frequency of encounters between providers and remote patients has to be elucidated by future research, Ms. Young said.
Ms. Young commented further, “With outpatient pulmonary rehabilitation there often isn’t a lot of one-on-one, but rather a big group of people exercising at the same time. I think actually there may be the potential to have more individualization with pulmonary telerehabilitation. But the barriers, the reimbursement/financial part, and the red tape and bureaucracy have to be worked on.”
As COVID-19 cedes its pandemic-scale status to the past, its wake is revealing surprises and raising questions, particularly in relation to pulmonary medicine. The need for isolation at COVID’s outset kept many millions at home, creating conditions favorable for the rapid expansion of technologies that were taken up quickly in telehealth applications. The need was overwhelming. But just how effective telehealth actually is at replacing on-site programs for COPD pulmonary rehab has remained a research challenge, although results from early studies show unmistakable value. Creating conditions conducive to research into the strengths and weaknesses of pulmonary rehab, and determining how research can be applied effectively, remain formidable challenges.
Early studies of telehealth pulmonary rehabilitation have not uncovered any glaring erosion of pulmonary rehabilitation’s well-established benefits. But, at the same time, the relatively young field of pulmonary telerehabilitation for chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) has lacked coordinated efforts to determine its key practices and the instruments for measuring them, both basic elements for pursuing research questions.
A 2021 American Thoracic Society workshop report (AE Holland, https://doi.org/10.1513/AnnalsATS.202102-146ST) identified essential components of a pulmonary rehabilitation model through an online Delphi process involving about 50 international experts. Components ultimately included those with median scores of 2 or higher (strongly agree or agree that the item is essential) and high consensus (interquartile range, 0). Thirteen essential components fit into four categories (Patient Assessment, Program Components, Method of Delivery and Quality Assurance). The Patient Assessment category included seven items: (1) An initial center-based assessment by a health care professional, (2) An exercise test at the time of assessment, (3) A field exercise test, (4) Quality of life measure, (5) Dyspnea assessment, (6) Nutritional status evaluation, and (7) Occupational status evaluation. The Program Components: (8) Endurance training and (9) Resistance training). The Method of Delivery: (10) An exercise program that is individually prescribed, (11) An exercise program that is individually progressed, and (12) Team includes a health care professional with experience in exercise prescription and progression. The single Quality Assurance item: (13) Health care professionals are trained to deliver the components of the model that is deployed.
Cochrane Library review
2021 “Intervention Review” (“Telerehabilitation for chronic respiratory disease,” https://doi.org/10.1002/14651858.CD013040.pub2). Using their own databases (eg, Cochrane Airways Trials Register) and others, the authors included controlled trials published up to November 30, 2020 with at least 50% of the rehabilitation delivered by telerehabilitation. The authors’ analysis of 15 studies (with 32 reports) including 1904 participants (99% with COPD): “There was probably little or no difference between telerehabilitation and in-person pulmonary rehabilitation for exercise capacity measured as 6-Minute Walking Distance (mean difference 0.06 meters (m), 95% confidence interval (CI) -10.82 m to 10.94 m).” They reached the same conclusion for quality of life, and for breathlessness. Completion of rehabilitation programs, however, was more likely with telerehabilitation at 93% versus 70% for in-person rehabilitation. No adverse effects of telerehabilitation were observed over and above those for in-person or no rehabilitation. An obvious limitation of the findings is that the studies all pre-date COVID-19, which would have introduced very significant disincentives for in-person rehabilitation completion.
An older (2016) international randomized controlled study (Zanaboni et al, https://doi.org/10.1186/s12890-016-0288-z) comparing long-term telerehabilitation or unsupervised treadmill training at home with standard care included 120 participants with COPD and had 2-years of follow-up. Telerehabilitation consisted of individualized treadmill training at home. Participants had scheduled exercise sessions supervised by a physiotherapist via videoconferencing following a standardized protocol. Participants in the unsupervised training group were provided with a treadmill only to perform unsupervised exercise at home. They also received an exercise booklet, a paper exercise diary to record their training sessions, and an individualized training program but without regular review or progression of the program. For the primary outcomes of combined hospitalizations and emergency department presentations, incidence rate of hospitalizations and emergency department presentations was lower with telerehabilitation (1.18 events per person-year; 95% confidence interval [CI], 0.94–1.46) and with unsupervised training group (1.14; 95% CI, 0.92–1.41) than in the control group (1.88; 95% CI, 1.58–2.21; P < .001 compared with intervention groups). Both training groups had better health status at 1-year, and achieved and maintained clinically significant improvements in exercise capacity.
Access to pulmonary rehabilitation
Continuing evidence of clear telerehabilitation benefits is good news, especially in the light of impediments to attendance at in-clinic programs. Although the COVID-provoked disincentives have been diminishing, persisting access issues remain for substantial portions of eligible populations, according to a recent (2024) cross-sectional study (PA Kahn, WA Mathis, doi:10.1001/jamanetworkopen.2023.54867) looking at travel time to pulmonary rehabilitation programs as a marker for pulmonary rehabilitation access. The report, based on US Census designations (lower 48 states and Washington, D.C.) found that while 80.3% of the population lives in urban or suburban areas within a 30-minute drive of a pulmonary rehabilitation program, travel time exceeds that in rural and other sparsely populated areas with more than 14 million people residing in areas demanding more than 1-hour for travel. A further analysis showed also that nearly 30% of American Indian and Alaska Native populations live more than 60 minutes from a pulmonary rehabilitation program.
Aside from the obvious restraints for homebound patients or those lacking transportation or who need medical transport, other common impediments inhibit on-site pulmonary rehabilitation attendance, said Corinne Young, MSN, FNP-C, FCCP. Ms. Young is the director of Advance Practice Provider and Clinical Services for Colorado Springs Pulmonary Consultants, president and founder of the Association of Pulmonary Advance Practice Providers, and a member of the CHEST Physician Editorial Board. “I have some patients who say ‘There’s no way I could do onsite pulmonary rehab because of my knee — or back, or shoulder.’ But in their own home environment they may feel more comfortable. They may be willing to try new things at their own pace, whereas for them a program may feel too regimented.” For others, Ms. Young said, aspects of a formal program are a clear plus factor. “They love to hear their progress at the end of — say a 12-week program — where their virtual respiratory therapist records and reports to them their six-minute walk and other test results. Feedback is a great reinforcer.” Quality of life improvements, Ms. Young commented, were one of the very impressive benefits that appeared in the initial studies of pulmonary rehabilitation for COPD patients. “Being patient-centric, you want to improve quality of life for them as much as possible and we see telerehabilitation as a great opportunity for many,” she added.
“I would like to see head-to-head data on outpatient versus at-home pulmonary rehabilitation on hospitalizations, time to exacerbation and, of course, mortality. We have all that for outpatient rehab, but it would be great to be able to compare them. Knowing that would influence what we recommend, especially for patients who could go either way. Also, you have to assess their motivation and discipline to know who might be more appropriate for unsupervised pulmonary rehabilitation.”
The current reality for Ms. Young is that in her Colorado Springs vicinity, where both in-patient programs are only 15 minutes apart, she knows of no telerehabilitation programs being offered. While there are contract telerehabilitation providers, Young said, and her organization (The Association of Pulmonary Advanced Practice Providers) has been approached by one, none are licensed in Colorado, and telerehabilitation is not a billable service.
“As of yet, I’m not aware of any telemedicine pulmonary rehab available at our institution,” said pulmonologist Mary Jo S. Farmer, MD, PhD, FCCP, Associate Professor of Medicine at UMass Chan Medical School – Baystate, Springfield, MA, and a member of the CHEST Physician Editorial Board. A brief internet search identified a telerehabilitation contract provider available only in Arizona.
Reimbursement will also be a foundational concern, Ms. Young commented. While a physician, nurse practitioner, or physician virtual visit for education may be billable, telerehabilitation reimbursement is new territory. “How that all is going to work out is a big unknown piece,” she said.
Minimal components
Effective pulmonary telerehabilitation programs, Ms. Young said, need to provide exercise with an aerobic device, either a treadmill, a stationary bike or even a Cubii-type under desk foot pedal/elliptical machine, and some resistance training (elastic bands, or weights, for example). “But 50% of pulmonary rehabilitation is education about breathing techniques, purse-lip breathing, and pulmonary nutrition.” Also essential: one-on-one discussion with a qualified medical practitioner who checks on oximeter use, inhaler technique, and titrating oxygen therapy. “At our elevation of 6500 feet, most of our patients are on that.” Optimal frequency of encounters between providers and remote patients has to be elucidated by future research, Ms. Young said.
Ms. Young commented further, “With outpatient pulmonary rehabilitation there often isn’t a lot of one-on-one, but rather a big group of people exercising at the same time. I think actually there may be the potential to have more individualization with pulmonary telerehabilitation. But the barriers, the reimbursement/financial part, and the red tape and bureaucracy have to be worked on.”
As COVID-19 cedes its pandemic-scale status to the past, its wake is revealing surprises and raising questions, particularly in relation to pulmonary medicine. The need for isolation at COVID’s outset kept many millions at home, creating conditions favorable for the rapid expansion of technologies that were taken up quickly in telehealth applications. The need was overwhelming. But just how effective telehealth actually is at replacing on-site programs for COPD pulmonary rehab has remained a research challenge, although results from early studies show unmistakable value. Creating conditions conducive to research into the strengths and weaknesses of pulmonary rehab, and determining how research can be applied effectively, remain formidable challenges.
Early studies of telehealth pulmonary rehabilitation have not uncovered any glaring erosion of pulmonary rehabilitation’s well-established benefits. But, at the same time, the relatively young field of pulmonary telerehabilitation for chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) has lacked coordinated efforts to determine its key practices and the instruments for measuring them, both basic elements for pursuing research questions.
A 2021 American Thoracic Society workshop report (AE Holland, https://doi.org/10.1513/AnnalsATS.202102-146ST) identified essential components of a pulmonary rehabilitation model through an online Delphi process involving about 50 international experts. Components ultimately included those with median scores of 2 or higher (strongly agree or agree that the item is essential) and high consensus (interquartile range, 0). Thirteen essential components fit into four categories (Patient Assessment, Program Components, Method of Delivery and Quality Assurance). The Patient Assessment category included seven items: (1) An initial center-based assessment by a health care professional, (2) An exercise test at the time of assessment, (3) A field exercise test, (4) Quality of life measure, (5) Dyspnea assessment, (6) Nutritional status evaluation, and (7) Occupational status evaluation. The Program Components: (8) Endurance training and (9) Resistance training). The Method of Delivery: (10) An exercise program that is individually prescribed, (11) An exercise program that is individually progressed, and (12) Team includes a health care professional with experience in exercise prescription and progression. The single Quality Assurance item: (13) Health care professionals are trained to deliver the components of the model that is deployed.
Cochrane Library review
2021 “Intervention Review” (“Telerehabilitation for chronic respiratory disease,” https://doi.org/10.1002/14651858.CD013040.pub2). Using their own databases (eg, Cochrane Airways Trials Register) and others, the authors included controlled trials published up to November 30, 2020 with at least 50% of the rehabilitation delivered by telerehabilitation. The authors’ analysis of 15 studies (with 32 reports) including 1904 participants (99% with COPD): “There was probably little or no difference between telerehabilitation and in-person pulmonary rehabilitation for exercise capacity measured as 6-Minute Walking Distance (mean difference 0.06 meters (m), 95% confidence interval (CI) -10.82 m to 10.94 m).” They reached the same conclusion for quality of life, and for breathlessness. Completion of rehabilitation programs, however, was more likely with telerehabilitation at 93% versus 70% for in-person rehabilitation. No adverse effects of telerehabilitation were observed over and above those for in-person or no rehabilitation. An obvious limitation of the findings is that the studies all pre-date COVID-19, which would have introduced very significant disincentives for in-person rehabilitation completion.
An older (2016) international randomized controlled study (Zanaboni et al, https://doi.org/10.1186/s12890-016-0288-z) comparing long-term telerehabilitation or unsupervised treadmill training at home with standard care included 120 participants with COPD and had 2-years of follow-up. Telerehabilitation consisted of individualized treadmill training at home. Participants had scheduled exercise sessions supervised by a physiotherapist via videoconferencing following a standardized protocol. Participants in the unsupervised training group were provided with a treadmill only to perform unsupervised exercise at home. They also received an exercise booklet, a paper exercise diary to record their training sessions, and an individualized training program but without regular review or progression of the program. For the primary outcomes of combined hospitalizations and emergency department presentations, incidence rate of hospitalizations and emergency department presentations was lower with telerehabilitation (1.18 events per person-year; 95% confidence interval [CI], 0.94–1.46) and with unsupervised training group (1.14; 95% CI, 0.92–1.41) than in the control group (1.88; 95% CI, 1.58–2.21; P < .001 compared with intervention groups). Both training groups had better health status at 1-year, and achieved and maintained clinically significant improvements in exercise capacity.
Access to pulmonary rehabilitation
Continuing evidence of clear telerehabilitation benefits is good news, especially in the light of impediments to attendance at in-clinic programs. Although the COVID-provoked disincentives have been diminishing, persisting access issues remain for substantial portions of eligible populations, according to a recent (2024) cross-sectional study (PA Kahn, WA Mathis, doi:10.1001/jamanetworkopen.2023.54867) looking at travel time to pulmonary rehabilitation programs as a marker for pulmonary rehabilitation access. The report, based on US Census designations (lower 48 states and Washington, D.C.) found that while 80.3% of the population lives in urban or suburban areas within a 30-minute drive of a pulmonary rehabilitation program, travel time exceeds that in rural and other sparsely populated areas with more than 14 million people residing in areas demanding more than 1-hour for travel. A further analysis showed also that nearly 30% of American Indian and Alaska Native populations live more than 60 minutes from a pulmonary rehabilitation program.
Aside from the obvious restraints for homebound patients or those lacking transportation or who need medical transport, other common impediments inhibit on-site pulmonary rehabilitation attendance, said Corinne Young, MSN, FNP-C, FCCP. Ms. Young is the director of Advance Practice Provider and Clinical Services for Colorado Springs Pulmonary Consultants, president and founder of the Association of Pulmonary Advance Practice Providers, and a member of the CHEST Physician Editorial Board. “I have some patients who say ‘There’s no way I could do onsite pulmonary rehab because of my knee — or back, or shoulder.’ But in their own home environment they may feel more comfortable. They may be willing to try new things at their own pace, whereas for them a program may feel too regimented.” For others, Ms. Young said, aspects of a formal program are a clear plus factor. “They love to hear their progress at the end of — say a 12-week program — where their virtual respiratory therapist records and reports to them their six-minute walk and other test results. Feedback is a great reinforcer.” Quality of life improvements, Ms. Young commented, were one of the very impressive benefits that appeared in the initial studies of pulmonary rehabilitation for COPD patients. “Being patient-centric, you want to improve quality of life for them as much as possible and we see telerehabilitation as a great opportunity for many,” she added.
“I would like to see head-to-head data on outpatient versus at-home pulmonary rehabilitation on hospitalizations, time to exacerbation and, of course, mortality. We have all that for outpatient rehab, but it would be great to be able to compare them. Knowing that would influence what we recommend, especially for patients who could go either way. Also, you have to assess their motivation and discipline to know who might be more appropriate for unsupervised pulmonary rehabilitation.”
The current reality for Ms. Young is that in her Colorado Springs vicinity, where both in-patient programs are only 15 minutes apart, she knows of no telerehabilitation programs being offered. While there are contract telerehabilitation providers, Young said, and her organization (The Association of Pulmonary Advanced Practice Providers) has been approached by one, none are licensed in Colorado, and telerehabilitation is not a billable service.
“As of yet, I’m not aware of any telemedicine pulmonary rehab available at our institution,” said pulmonologist Mary Jo S. Farmer, MD, PhD, FCCP, Associate Professor of Medicine at UMass Chan Medical School – Baystate, Springfield, MA, and a member of the CHEST Physician Editorial Board. A brief internet search identified a telerehabilitation contract provider available only in Arizona.
Reimbursement will also be a foundational concern, Ms. Young commented. While a physician, nurse practitioner, or physician virtual visit for education may be billable, telerehabilitation reimbursement is new territory. “How that all is going to work out is a big unknown piece,” she said.
Minimal components
Effective pulmonary telerehabilitation programs, Ms. Young said, need to provide exercise with an aerobic device, either a treadmill, a stationary bike or even a Cubii-type under desk foot pedal/elliptical machine, and some resistance training (elastic bands, or weights, for example). “But 50% of pulmonary rehabilitation is education about breathing techniques, purse-lip breathing, and pulmonary nutrition.” Also essential: one-on-one discussion with a qualified medical practitioner who checks on oximeter use, inhaler technique, and titrating oxygen therapy. “At our elevation of 6500 feet, most of our patients are on that.” Optimal frequency of encounters between providers and remote patients has to be elucidated by future research, Ms. Young said.
Ms. Young commented further, “With outpatient pulmonary rehabilitation there often isn’t a lot of one-on-one, but rather a big group of people exercising at the same time. I think actually there may be the potential to have more individualization with pulmonary telerehabilitation. But the barriers, the reimbursement/financial part, and the red tape and bureaucracy have to be worked on.”
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All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, copied, or otherwise reproduced or distributed without the prior written permission of Frontline Medical Communications Inc.</copyrightNotice> </rightsInfo> </provider> <abstract/> <metaDescription>“To date there has not been a comprehensive assessment of the clinical efficacy or safety of telerehabilitation, or its ability to improve uptake and access to </metaDescription> <articlePDF/> <teaserImage>285738</teaserImage> <teaser>Telehealth options for pulmonary rehabilitation may increase access, but reimbursement and assessment remain hurdles.</teaser> <title>Pulmonary telerehabilitation for COPD: Promising, but more data needed</title> <deck/> <disclaimer/> <AuthorList/> <articleURL/> <doi/> <pubMedID/> <publishXMLStatus/> <publishXMLVersion>1</publishXMLVersion> <useEISSN>0</useEISSN> <urgency/> <pubPubdateYear/> <pubPubdateMonth/> <pubPubdateDay/> <pubVolume/> <pubNumber/> <wireChannels/> <primaryCMSID/> <CMSIDs/> <keywords/> <seeAlsos/> <publications_g> <publicationData> <publicationCode>chph</publicationCode> <pubIssueName/> <pubArticleType/> <pubTopics/> <pubCategories/> <pubSections/> </publicationData> </publications_g> <publications> <term canonical="true">6</term> </publications> <sections> <term canonical="true">39313</term> </sections> <topics> <term>284</term> <term canonical="true">41038</term> </topics> <links> <link> <itemClass qcode="ninat:picture"/> <altRep contenttype="image/jpeg">images/24010ab9.jpg</altRep> <description role="drol:caption">Corinne Young</description> <description role="drol:credit">Courtesy ACCP</description> </link> <link> <itemClass qcode="ninat:picture"/> <altRep contenttype="image/jpeg">images/2400d5ad.jpg</altRep> <description role="drol:caption">Dr. Mary Jo S. Farmer</description> <description role="drol:credit">CHEST</description> </link> <link> <itemClass qcode="ninat:picture"/> <altRep contenttype="image/jpeg">images/240129a6.jpg</altRep> <description role="drol:caption"/> <description role="drol:credit">Kobus Louw/E+/Getty Images</description> </link> </links> </header> <itemSet> <newsItem> <itemMeta> <itemRole>Main</itemRole> <itemClass>text</itemClass> <title>Pulmonary telerehabilitation for COPD: Promising, but more data needed</title> <deck/> </itemMeta> <itemContent> <p>As COVID-19 cedes its pandemic-scale status to the past, its wake is revealing surprises and raising questions, particularly in relation to pulmonary medicine. The need for isolation at COVID’s outset kept many millions at home, creating conditions favorable for the rapid expansion of technologies that were taken up quickly in telehealth applications. The need was overwhelming. But just how effective telehealth actually is at replacing on-site programs for COPD pulmonary rehab has remained a research challenge, although results from early studies show unmistakable value. Creating conditions conducive to research into the strengths and weaknesses of pulmonary rehab, and determining how research can be applied effectively, remain formidable challenges. </p> <p>Early studies of telehealth pulmonary rehabilitation have not uncovered any glaring erosion of pulmonary rehabilitation’s well-established benefits. But, at the same time, the relatively young field of pulmonary telerehabilitation for chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) has lacked coordinated efforts to determine its key practices and the instruments for measuring them, both basic elements for pursuing research questions. <br/><br/>A 2021 American Thoracic Society workshop report (AE Holland, <span class="Hyperlink"><a href="https://doi.org/10.1513/AnnalsATS.202102-146ST">https://doi.org/10.1513/AnnalsATS.202102-146ST</a></span>) identified essential components of a pulmonary rehabilitation model through an online Delphi process involving about 50 international experts. Components ultimately included those with median scores of 2 or higher (strongly agree or agree that the item is essential) and high consensus (interquartile range, 0). Thirteen essential components fit into four categories (Patient Assessment, Program Components, Method of Delivery and Quality Assurance). The Patient Assessment category included seven items: (1) An initial center-based assessment by a health care professional, (2) An exercise test at the time of assessment, (3) A field exercise test, (4) Quality of life measure, (5) Dyspnea assessment, (6) Nutritional status evaluation, and (7) Occupational status evaluation. The Program Components: (8) Endurance training and (9) Resistance training). The Method of Delivery: (10) An exercise program that is individually prescribed, (11) An exercise program that is individually progressed, and (12) Team includes a health care professional with experience in exercise prescription and progression. The single Quality Assurance item: (13) Health care professionals are trained to deliver the components of the model that is deployed. <br/><br/></p> <h2>Cochrane Library review</h2> <p><span class="tag metaDescription">“To date there has not been a comprehensive assessment of the clinical efficacy or safety of telerehabilitation, or its ability to improve uptake and access to rehabilitation services for people with chronic respiratory disease,” stated the Cochrane Collaboration NS Cox et al.</span> 2021 “Intervention Review” (“Telerehabilitation for chronic respiratory disease,” <span class="Hyperlink"><a href="https://doi.org/10.1002/14651858.CD013040.pub2">https://doi.org/10.1002/14651858.CD013040.pub2</a></span>). Using their own databases (eg, Cochrane Airways Trials Register) and others, the authors included controlled trials published up to November 30, 2020 with at least 50% of the rehabilitation delivered by telerehabilitation. The authors’ analysis of 15 studies (with 32 reports) including 1904 participants (99% with COPD): “There was probably little or no difference between telerehabilitation and in-person pulmonary rehabilitation for exercise capacity measured as 6-Minute Walking Distance (mean difference 0.06 meters (m), 95% confidence interval (CI) -10.82 m to 10.94 m).” They reached the same conclusion for quality of life, and for breathlessness. Completion of rehabilitation programs, however, was more likely with telerehabilitation at 93% versus 70% for in-person rehabilitation. No adverse effects of telerehabilitation were observed over and above those for in-person or no rehabilitation. An obvious limitation of the findings is that the studies all pre-date COVID-19, which would have introduced very significant disincentives for in-person rehabilitation completion.</p> <p>An older (2016) international randomized controlled study (Zanaboni et al, https://doi.org/<span class="Hyperlink"><a href="https://bmcpulmmed.biomedcentral.com/articles/10.1186/s12890-016-0288-z">10.1186/s12890-016-0288-z</a></span>) comparing long-term telerehabilitation or unsupervised treadmill training at home with standard care included 120 participants with COPD and had 2-years of follow-up. Telerehabilitation consisted of individualized treadmill training at home. Participants had scheduled exercise sessions supervised by a physiotherapist via videoconferencing following a standardized protocol. Participants in the unsupervised training group were provided with a treadmill only to perform unsupervised exercise at home. They also received an exercise booklet, a paper exercise diary to record their training sessions, and an individualized training program but without regular review or progression of the program. For the primary outcomes of combined hospitalizations and emergency department presentations, incidence rate of hospitalizations and emergency department presentations was lower with telerehabilitation (1.18 events per person-year; 95% confidence interval [CI], 0.94–1.46) and with unsupervised training group (1.14; 95% CI, 0.92–1.41) than in the control group (1.88; 95% CI, 1.58–2.21; <em>P </em>< .001 compared with intervention groups). Both training groups had better health status at 1-year, and achieved and maintained clinically significant improvements in exercise capacity.<br/><br/></p> <h2>Access to pulmonary rehabilitation</h2> <p>Continuing evidence of clear telerehabilitation benefits is good news, especially in the light of impediments to attendance at in-clinic programs. Although the COVID-provoked disincentives have been diminishing, persisting access issues remain for substantial portions of eligible populations, according to a recent (2024) cross-sectional study (PA Kahn, WA Mathis, doi:10.1001/jamanetworkopen.2023.54867) looking at travel time to pulmonary rehabilitation programs as a marker for pulmonary rehabilitation access. The report, based on US Census designations (lower 48 states and Washington, D.C.) found that while 80.3% of the population lives in urban or suburban areas within a 30-minute drive of a pulmonary rehabilitation program, travel time exceeds that in rural and other sparsely populated areas with more than 14 million people residing in areas demanding more than 1-hour for travel. A further analysis showed also that nearly 30% of American Indian and Alaska Native populations live more than 60 minutes from a pulmonary rehabilitation program.</p> <p>Aside from the obvious restraints for homebound patients or those lacking transportation or who need medical transport, other common impediments inhibit on-site pulmonary rehabilitation attendance, said Corinne Young, MSN, FNP-C, FCCP. Ms. Young is the director of Advance Practice Provider and Clinical Services for Colorado Springs Pulmonary Consultants, president and founder of the Association of Pulmonary Advance Practice Providers, and a member of the <em>CHEST Physician</em> Editorial Board. “I have some patients who say ‘There’s no way I could do onsite pulmonary rehab because of my knee — or back, or shoulder.’ But in their own home environment they may feel more comfortable. They may be willing to try new things at their own pace, whereas for them a program may feel too regimented.” For others, Ms. Young said, aspects of a formal program are a clear plus factor. “They love to hear their progress at the end of — say a 12-week program — where their virtual respiratory therapist records and reports to them their six-minute walk and other test results. Feedback is a great reinforcer.” Quality of life improvements, Ms. Young commented, were one of the very impressive benefits that appeared in the initial studies of pulmonary rehabilitation for COPD patients. “Being patient-centric, you want to improve quality of life for them as much as possible and we see telerehabilitation as a great opportunity for many,” she added.[[{"fid":"285738","view_mode":"medstat_image_flush_right","fields":{"format":"medstat_image_flush_right","field_file_image_alt_text[und][0][value]":"Corinne Young, a nurse practitioner and director of APP and Clinical Services for Colorado Springs Pulmonary Consultants in Colorado.","field_file_image_credit[und][0][value]":"Courtesy ACCP","field_file_image_caption[und][0][value]":"Corinne Young"},"type":"media","attributes":{"class":"media-element file-medstat_image_flush_right"}}]]<br/><br/>“I would like to see head-to-head data on outpatient versus at-home pulmonary rehabilitation on hospitalizations, time to exacerbation and, of course, mortality. We have all that for outpatient rehab, but it would be great to be able to compare them. Knowing that would influence what we recommend, especially for patients who could go either way. Also, you have to assess their motivation and discipline to know who might be more appropriate for unsupervised pulmonary rehabilitation.”<br/><br/>The current reality for Ms. Young is that in her Colorado Springs vicinity, where both in-patient programs are only 15 minutes apart, she knows of no telerehabilitation programs being offered. While there are contract telerehabilitation providers, Young said, and her organization (The Association of Pulmonary Advanced Practice Providers) has been approached by one, none are licensed in Colorado, and telerehabilitation is not a billable service.<br/><br/>“As of yet, I’m not aware of any telemedicine pulmonary rehab available at our institution,” said pulmonologist Mary Jo S. Farmer, MD, PhD, FCCP, Associate Professor of Medicine at UMass Chan Medical School – Baystate, Springfield, MA, and a member of the <em>CHEST Physician</em> Editorial Board. A brief internet search identified a telerehabilitation contract provider available only in Arizona. [[{"fid":"256583","view_mode":"medstat_image_flush_left","fields":{"format":"medstat_image_flush_left","field_file_image_alt_text[und][0][value]":"Dr. Mary Jo S. Farmer, directory of pulmonary hypertension services at Baystate Health in Springfield, Mass.","field_file_image_credit[und][0][value]":"CHEST","field_file_image_caption[und][0][value]":"Dr. Mary Jo S. Farmer"},"type":"media","attributes":{"class":"media-element file-medstat_image_flush_left"}}]]<br/><br/>Reimbursement will also be a foundational concern, Ms. Young commented. While a physician, nurse practitioner, or physician virtual visit for education may be billable, telerehabilitation reimbursement is new territory. “How that all is going to work out is a big unknown piece,” she said.</p> <h2>Minimal components</h2> <p>Effective pulmonary telerehabilitation programs, Ms. Young said, need to provide exercise with an aerobic device, either a treadmill, a stationary bike or even a Cubii-type under desk foot pedal/elliptical machine, and some resistance training (elastic bands, or weights, for example). “But 50% of pulmonary rehabilitation is education about breathing techniques, purse-lip breathing, and pulmonary nutrition.” Also essential: one-on-one discussion with a qualified medical practitioner who checks on oximeter use, inhaler technique, and titrating oxygen therapy. “At our elevation of 6500 feet, most of our patients are on that.” Optimal frequency of encounters between providers and remote patients has to be elucidated by future research, Ms. Young said. [[{"fid":"301658","view_mode":"medstat_image_flush_left","fields":{"format":"medstat_image_flush_left","field_file_image_alt_text[und][0][value]":"walking on home treadmill","field_file_image_credit[und][0][value]":"Kobus Louw/E+/Getty Images","field_file_image_caption[und][0][value]":""},"type":"media","attributes":{"class":"media-element file-medstat_image_flush_left"}}]]<br/><br/>Ms. Young commented further, “With outpatient pulmonary rehabilitation there often isn’t a lot of one-on-one, but rather a big group of people exercising at the same time. I think actually there may be the potential to have more individualization with pulmonary telerehabilitation. But the barriers, the reimbursement/financial part, and the red tape and bureaucracy have to be worked on.”</p> </itemContent> </newsItem> <newsItem> <itemMeta> <itemRole>teaser</itemRole> <itemClass>text</itemClass> <title/> <deck/> </itemMeta> <itemContent> </itemContent> </newsItem> </itemSet></root>
