• Nayara Alexia Moreno, Bruno Garcia de Aquino, Isabel Fialho Garcia, Lucas Spadoni Tavares, Larissa Francielly Costa, Ivens Willians Silva Giacomassi, and Adriana Cláudia Lunardi.
• Master and Doctoral Program in Physical Therapy, Universidade Cidade de São Paulo, São Paulo, Brazil.
• J Physiother. 2019 Oct 1; 65 (4): 208-214.

QuestionsDoes advice from a physiotherapist about the importance of staying physically active during hospitalisation improve activity, mobility, strength, length of stay, and complications in older inpatients? What barriers to physical activity during hospitalisation do older inpatients perceive?DesignRandomised controlled trial with concealed allocation, intention-to-treat analysis, and blinded assessment.ParticipantsSixty-eight people who were aged > 60 years and admitted to a university hospital ward.InterventionIn addition to usual hospital care, the experimental group received a booklet with content about the deleterious effects of hospitalisation and the importance of staying active during hospitalisation. The control group received usual hospital care only.Outcome MeasuresThe amount of physical activity was measured via accelerometry during the hospital admission. Mobility was assessed using the de Morton Mobility Index (DEMMI), and muscle strength was assessed using a handgrip dynamometer. Length of stay and complications were extracted from hospital records. The barriers to staying active during hospitalisation were investigated via a questionnaire.ResultsAccelerometry showed a mean between-group difference of 974 steps/day (95% CI 28 to 1919) in favour of the experimental group. The intervention also increased moderate-intensity physical activity and reduced sedentary time, although these effects might be trivially small. Experimental group participants were about one-fifth as likely to lose mobility during their hospital admission (two of 33) than control group participants (10 of 35), relative risk 0.21 (95% CI 0.05 to 0.90). Effects of the intervention were unclear regarding muscle strength, length of stay and incidence of complications between the groups. Patients reported that the main barriers to remaining active during hospitalisation were dyspnoea, lack of space, and fear of contracting infection.ConclusionIn older inpatients, the addition of advice from a physiotherapist about maintaining activity during hospitalisation increases the level of physical activity and prevents loss of mobility.RegistrationClinicalTrials.govNCT03297567.Copyright © 2019 Australian Physiotherapy Association. Published by Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.

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