ZuWallack - Figure 4
Pulmonary Rehab and Quality of Life: Add Pulmonary Rehab
FIG. 4: Following the results illustrated in the previous Figure, if the same patients who were maximally bronchodilated with optimized pharmacology also received pulmonary rehabilitation, a quantitatively greater improvement in HRQOL might be achieved, since addition of pulmonary rehabilitation is generally associated with a greater increase in HRQOL than treatment with bronchodilators alone.[5] In other words, once a patient’s pharmacologic treatment has been optimized, then if that patient still has a reduced QOL, with disturbing symptoms such as dyspnea and exercise intolerance, then adding pulmonary rehabilitation at that point might be expected to result in substantial additional benefit in the patient’s condition.
References
Celli BR, Decramer M, Wedzicha JA, et al; ATS/ERS Task Force for COPD Research. An official American Thoracic Society/European Respiratory Society statement: Research questions in chronic obstructive pulmonary disease. Am J Respir Crit Care Med. 2015;191:e4–e27.
