The impact of endoscopic lung volume reduction on physical activity coaching in patients with severe emphysema

Endoscopic lung volume reduction (ELVR) aims to improve pulmonary function in severe emphysema. Physical activity (PA) coaching is expected to improve daily life PA. When improving ventilatory constrains in severe COPD, a better response to PA coaching is expected. The present study investigated the impact of PA coaching in addition to ELVR in severe emphysema.

Patients allocated, based on fissure integrity, in the ELVR or no-ELVR cohort, received the PA coaching intervention with a step counter and smartphone application from 3 to 6 months follow-up. The primary end-point of this research question was the change in daily step count from baseline to 6 months follow-up compared between the ELVR and no-ELVR cohort. The secondary end-points were time spent in moderate to vigorous PA, movement intensity and patient-reported experience with PA between ELVR and no-ELVR.

At 6 months, PA in both ELVR+coaching (1479±460 steps·day^-1; p=0.001) and no-ELVR+coaching (1910±663 steps·day^-1; p=0.004) improved within group, without significant between-group differences (-405±781 steps·day^-1; p=0.60). Patients in the ELVR group tended to experience less difficulty with PA compared to no-ELVR+coaching (7±4 points, p=0.08).

We found that PA coaching is feasible and can help to enhance PA in patients with severe emphysema. Improving the ventilatory capacity through ELVR is not a prerequisite for a successful coaching intervention to increase objectively measured PA, although it alleviates patients' experienced difficulty with PA in those with severe COPD.