title: Approaches to daily body condition management in patients with stable chronic obstructive pulmonary disease.
abstract: OBJECTIVE
  To clarify the characteristics of sub-groups of patients with stable chronic obstructive pulmonary disease having similar approaches to daily body condition management.
  
  
  BACKGROUND
  Prior literature has shed light on the experience of patients with chronic obstructive pulmonary disease and revealed that these patients engage in many activities and try different things in their daily lives to regulate and manage their body condition. The research so far has all been qualitative, comprising mostly interviews, and no quantitative studies have been performed. In this study, cluster analysis was used to show that subgroups of patients with similar characteristics undertake similar approaches to body condition management.
  
  
  METHODS
  Descriptive, correlational study.
  
  
  METHODS
  Invitations to participate in the survey were extended to patients with stable chronic obstructive pulmonary disease. Cluster analysis was performed on the basis of questionnaire scores relating to nine different categories of daily body condition management actions. The characteristics of the body condition management approaches, in each subgroup, were investigated using analysis of variance and multiple comparisons.
  
  
  RESULTS
  The cluster analysis produced six subgroups, each defined by the effort expended as part of their body condition management. The subgroups also differed depending on patient age and disease severity.
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  Body condition management approaches taken by patients with stable chronic obstructive pulmonary disease are overall, comprehensive approaches.
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  Patients with chronic obstructive pulmonary disease were subgrouped based on their engagement in body conditioning. Relationships between the subgroups and the engagement in body conditioning, age and shortness of breath severity were observed. The care of patient support should be comprehensive and depend on their age and the duration of the disease. In addition, it should be long term and recognise that the patients are living their own respective lives. Such considerations and focused perspectives are what we think will lead to an improvement in patients' quality of life and prevent their condition from worsening.
authors.affiliation: School of Nursing, Faculty of Medicine, Tokyo Medical University, Tokyo, Japan. t_kawada@tokyo-med.ac.jp.
authors.forename: Terue
authors.initials: T
authors.lastname: Kawada
mesh_terms: D000203:Activities of Daily Living; D000368:Aged; D019468:Disease Management; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged; D029424:Pulmonary Disease, Chronic Obstructive / Q000150:complications / Q000503:physiopathology* / Q000534:rehabilitation*; D011788:Quality of Life; D011795:Surveys and Questionnaires
keywords: body condition; chronic obstructive pulmonary disease; cluster analysis; daily life