Clinician-Led Balance Training in Pulmonary Rehabilitation

Guidelines for pulmonary rehabilitation (PR) include balance training but lack specific parameters. After a knowledge translation project at our site, clinicians modified the physiotherapy programme to facilitate the sustainability of balance training as part of PR. The purpose of this study was to explore whether the modified programme resulted in improved balance and balance confidence. A secondary aim was to provide information on the way in which balance training was operationalized as part of PR for clinicians wanting to incorporate it into an existing PR programme. We conducted a retrospective study of patients with chronic obstructive pulmonary disease, enrolled in a 4- to 6-week inpatient PR programme over a 1-year period. Balance training was provided biweekly with a staff-to-patient ratio of 2:11. Participants completed the brief Balance Evaluation Systems Test (brief-BESTest) and Activities-Specific Balance Confidence (ABC) scale at the beginning and end of PR. The 85 participants had a mean age of 69.5 (SD 9.0) years. After completing an average of 7.6 balance sessions (min-max 2-13), participants showed improvements in brief-BESTest (mean difference 3.2 [95% CI: 2.5, 3.9] points) and ABC (mean difference 7.8 [95% CI: 4.1, 11.5] percent). A staff-to-patient ratio of 2:11 and a training frequency of twice per week for 4-6 weeks improved balance. This result will inform how we incorporate balance training into existing PR programmes.