COVID-19 patients receiving mechanical ventilation who were extubated and survived, benefitted from pulmonary rehabilitation, with those beginning PR before day 7 recovering faster than those enrolled day 7 or later, according to data presented at the ERS 2020 virtual Congress.
“Pulmonary rehabilitation post-COVID-19, the sooner and the longer, is better,” Yara Al Chikhanie, PhD student in pulmonary physiopathology and rehabilitation at Grenoble Alpes University, France, said during a presentation.
After rehabilitation, mean 6-minute walk distance improved from 120 m to 337 m and patients reached, on average, 43% of the normal predicted distance. Patients with a longer delay from extubation to pulmonary rehabilitation had significantly lower improvement in 6-minute walk distance, according to the results.
