[Weaning of Long-term ICU Patients: Potential of Physical Therapy]

Physiotherapy plays an important role in intensive care medicine in restoring mobility, flexibility, coordination, and quality of life. But the data regarding its use in the weaning of long-term patients are inconsistent and provide little basis for structured approaches. There are no clear data on therapy volume, frequency, or stop signals, which makes it difficult to create structured weaning guidelines.Based on recent literature, aspects of physiotherapy that can be applied to ICU patients are explored and it is underlined that physiotherapy can be regarded as safe and efficient, yet quite unstructured. Furthermore, rational outcome expectations and parameters are discussed based on recent evidence.The article outlines how modern therapy and weaning concepts can be designed and why future research should focus on determining the correct therapy volume for different patient groups. Readers learn why integrating interdisciplinary teams with knowledge from sports and nutrition medicine makes sense and how this approach can help long-term patients.