A chest rehabilitation program that emphasizes the rural patient.
This paper describes the multifaceted chest rehabilitation program at a referral-teaching hospital in Saskatchewan. The program was developed following recognition of the special needs of rural patients undergoing treatment for chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD). It has evolved to include three aspects. The first is concerned with the rural patient as an inpatient who participates in chest, exercise and education classes, in conjunction with medical treatment, and whose discharge needs are recognized and acted upon while in hospital. The second aspect is that of the one-day educational workshop aimed at outpatients not yet requiring hospitalization. The third aspect pertains to the educational seminars organized to help the rural health professional in fulfilling a role in his or her community, whether assisting patients with COPD at home or in hospital. In the future, in order to assess the efficacy of this multifaceted program, a formal research study devised according to the data obtained through a preliminary survey of 101 of the program's inpatients should be undertaken.
D006746:Hospital Bed Capacity, 500 and over; D006801:Humans; D008173:Lung Diseases, Obstructive / Q000534:rehabilitation*; D010348:Patient Care Team; D010353:Patient Education as Topic; D012423:Rural Health; D012525:Saskatchewan