2004 OPEN FORUM Abstracts
APPLICATION OF THE NEW FACILITATION SYSTEM OF LOCOMOTOR RESPIRATORY COUPLING FOR PULMONARY REHABILITATION OF PATIENTS WITH RESPIRATORY FAILURE
Akira
Tamaki, MS, RPT, RCET; Department of Physical Therapy, School of
Health Sciences, Faculty of Medicine, Kyoto University, Kyoto, Japan.
Satoshi Hasegawa, RPT, Kazuo Chin, MD; Rehabilitation units, Kyoto
University Hospital. Kyoto, Japan. Michiaki Mishima, MD; Department
of Respiratory Medicine, Kyoto University, Kyoto, Japan.
INTRODUCTION:
It
is known that respiratory rhythm entrains to rhythmical movement, a
phenomenon called Locomotor Respiratory Coupling (LRC). We
investigated and reported on LRC in healthy subjects, and noted that
the LRC phenomenon enhances ventilation efficiency during exercise.
Another study has shown that LRC decreases oxygen consumption (VO2)
during cycling at a moderate workload. Therefore, we investigated
whether LRC phenomenon may be applied to exercise training for
patients with respiratory failure. We developed new ergometer system
software (Strength Ergo 240BK-ERG003: SE, Mitsubishi Electric
Engineering, Japan), which facilitates LRC using visual and acoustic
signals. The aim of our study was to investigate the effect of this
system for pulmonary rehabilitation of patients with respiratory
failure.
METHODS:
The properties of this new system software are as follow. 1) Voice
and word signal such as "breathe in" , "breathe
out",
appear on the PC display which is synchronized with the pedaling
angle. 2) The signal always appears at a settled pedaling position,
because timing of the signal is controlled by the pedaling position.
Therefore, the
slower the pedaling rate per min.,the slower the signal appearance.
3) This software can create various ratios (locomotion/respiration)
and choose from the following:1:1,3:2,2:1, 5:2,3:1,7:2,4:1. 4) The
software can change the signal setting during exercise. Four
patients with respiratory failure (LAM 1, COPD 3) participated in
this study. We measured SpO2, RPE (Borg Scale), HR, and exercise
tolerance (maximum duration of continuous exercise) both with and
without this system during pedaling exercise, and compared the
differences between outcome measures with and without this system.
RESULTS:
With this system, SpO2 was higher than without this system during
exercise. RPE and HR with this system were lower than without this
system during exercise. Exercise tolerance (duration) with this
system was longer than without.
CONCLUSIONS:
We
concluded that this LRC facilitatory system can be applied to
pulmonary rehabilitation of patients with respiratory failure.