Cardiopulmonary physical therapy practice in the paediatric intensive care unit

Physical therapists play an important role in the pediatric intensive care setting. The purpose of this study was to describe current cardiopulmonary physical therapy (CPT) practices in a pediatric cardiac critical care unit (CCCU) and a pediatric intensive care unit (PICU), as well as to determine the feasibility of obtaining clinically relevant outcome measures in this setting.

We obtained reasons for admission, CPT treatment patterns, and availability of chest X-rays interpretation via a retrospective chart review of children who received CPT while in the PICU and CCCU (n=111).

Congenital cardiac conditions (34.2%) and primary respiratory deterioration (27.9%) were the most common reasons for admission; 50% of the children had associated diagnoses (e.g., developmental delay). Manual hyperinflation with expiratory vibration was the most common CPT treatment. Chest X-ray interpretation was available in 72% of the charts.

Manual hyperinflation with expiratory vibration was used across diagnostic groups in the CCCU and PICU; its effectiveness therefore requires further study. Chest X-ray is an important clinical outcome and therefore needs to be recorded in a standardized manner to be useful for future clinical research studies.