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Abstract
Objectives The study aimed to describe and compare the clinical physiotherapy management of patients hospitalised due to chest trauma in South Africa (SA) and Sweden.
Design A prospective observational multicentre international study.
Setting Two university-affiliated public sector hospitals in SA and four university-affiliated public sector hospitals in Sweden.
Participants In total, 364 adults, hospitalised due to chest trauma were consecutively recruited of which 179 were from SA and 185 were from Sweden.
Outcome measures Physiotherapy practice was recorded in parallel with standard care. In addition, pulmonary complications and length of hospital stay were collected.
Results Despite differences in the type of trauma between the national cohorts (83% penetrating traumas in SA and 95% blunt traumas in Sweden), most patients received physiotherapy treatment during the first 3 days in hospital. Physiotherapy interventions such as mobilisation (day 1: sit on edge of bed; days 1–3: walking) and exercises to maintain range of motion (days 1–3: shoulder; day 3: trunk) were initiated earlier in SA (p<0.05). Treatment with the active cycle of breathing technique was more used in SA while deep breathing exercises were more common in Sweden and positive expiratory pressure was common in both countries. Length of stay was in mean 5.4 (95% CI 4.8, 6.0) days in SA and 6.6 (5.8, 7.4) days in Sweden (p=0.024).
Conclusions Despite differences in trauma panoramas and the national cohorts there seem to be similarities in clinical physiotherapy practices between the two countries.
- Trauma
- TRAUMA MANAGEMENT
- Physical Therapy Modalities
Data availability statement
Data are available upon reasonable request.
This is an open access article distributed in accordance with the Creative Commons Attribution Non Commercial (CC BY-NC 4.0) license, which permits others to distribute, remix, adapt, build upon this work non-commercially, and license their derivative works on different terms, provided the original work is properly cited, appropriate credit is given, any changes made indicated, and the use is non-commercial. See: http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/.
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Data availability statement
Data are available upon reasonable request.
Footnotes
Contributors MFO and HVA had full access to all the data in the study and was responsible for the integrity of the data and the accuracy of the data analysis. Concept and design: MFO, MSe, AS, RR, MSl, AS-R and HVA. Acquisition and analysis: MFO and HVA. Interpretation of results: MFO, MSe, AS, RR, MSl, AS-R and HVA. Critical revision of the manuscript: MFO, MSe, AS, RR, MSl, AS-R and HVA. Statistical analysis: Statistical consultants, MFO and AS-R. Guarantor: MFO.
Funding This work was supported by the National Research Foundation of South Africa under grant [141963] and by the Swedish state under the agreement between the Swedish government and the county councils, the ALF-agreement under grant [ALFGBG-718811].
Competing interests None declared.
Patient and public involvement Patients and/or the public were not involved in the design, or conduct, or reporting, or dissemination plans of this research.
Provenance and peer review Not commissioned; externally peer reviewed.
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