Physiother Can
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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. ⋯ 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.
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To evaluate the effects of prehabilitation (enhancing physical capacity before total hip or knee joint arthroplasty) on pain and physical function of adults with severe hip and knee osteoarthritis (OA). ⋯ This study presents preliminary evidence that prehabilitation improves physical function even in the most severely compromised patients with OA awaiting TJA.
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Significant arm morbidity is reported following surgery for breast cancer, yet physiotherapy is not commonly part of usual care. This study compared the effect on arm morbidity after surgery for breast cancer of a clinical care pathway including preoperative education, prospective monitoring, and early physiotherapy (experimental group) to that of preoperative education alone (comparison group). ⋯ Initial results are promising and support the feasibility of integrating a surveillance approach into follow-up care. This pilot study provides the foundation for a larger, more definitive trial.
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To determine whether a difference exists between patients' self-ratings of amount of change and their self-ratings of importance of change. ⋯ Assessing the amount of change is not the same as assessing the importance of change. When the goal is to estimate important change, the reference standard should direct patients to judge the importance of the change.