Elsevier

Respiratory Medicine

Volume 101, Issue 12, December 2007, Pages 2429-2436
Respiratory Medicine

Evidence-Based Review
Role of physiotherapy in the management of chronic lung diseases: An overview of systematic reviews

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.rmed.2007.06.007Get rights and content
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Summary

Four Cochrane respiratory reviews of relevance to physiotherapeutic practice are discussed in this overview. Physiotherapists aim to improve ventilation for people with respiratory disease, and approach this using a variety of techniques. As such, the reviews chosen for discussion consider a wide range of interventions commonly used by physiotherapists: breathing exercises, bronchopulmonary hygiene techniques and physical training for peripheral and respiratory muscles. The reviews show that breathing exercises may have beneficial effects on health-related quality of life in asthma, and that inspiratory muscle training (IMT) may improve inspiratory muscle strength. However, the clinical relevance of increased respiratory muscle strength per se is unknown, and the longer-term effects of breathing exercises on morbidity have not been considered. One review clearly shows that bronchopulmonary hygiene techniques in chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) and bronchiectasis increase sputum production. Frequent exacerbation is associated with increased sputum and high bacterial load, suggesting that there may be important therapeutic benefit of improved sputum clearance. Future studies evaluating the long-term effects of bronchopulmonary hygiene techniques on morbidity are recommended. In the third review, the importance of pulmonary rehabilitation in the management of COPD is once again reinforced. Physiotherapists are crucial to the delivery of exercise training programmes, and it is likely that the effects of pulmonary rehabilitation extend to other important outcomes, such as hospital admission and re-admission. On the basis of the evidence provided by these Cochrane reviews, this overview highlights important practice points of relevance to physiotherapy, and recommendations for future studies.

Keywords

Review
Physical therapy
Physiotherapy
Respiratory

Cited by (0)

The following Cochrane reviews have been cited in this Evidence-Based Review: Holloway E, Ram FS. Breathing excercises for asthma, Issue 1, 2004; Jones AP, Rowe BH. Bronchopulmonary hygiene physical therapy for chronic obstructive pulmonary disease and bronchiectasis, Issue 2, 2000; Lacasse Y, et al. Pulmonary rehabilitation for chronic obstructive pulmonary disease, Issue 4, 2006; Ram FS, et al. Inspiratory muscle training for asthma, Issue 4, 2003.