Perspective of Pulmonary Rehabilitation Centers in Latin America.

Pulmonary rehabilitation (PR) is a mandatory component of a comprehensive treatment of patients with chronic respiratory disease. However, there is no officially published data about PR Centers in Latin America.The objetive is to identify Latin American Pulmonary Rehabilitation Centers and evaluate their characteristics and organizational aspects.A cross-sectional study with the Pulmonary Rehabilitation Centers indicated by the Latin American Respiratory and Physiotherapy Societies and by our own personal survey among physicians and physiotherapists. An eletronic transmission questionnaire with 20 questions was sent to the Coordinator of each one of the Centers.217 Pulmonary Rehabilitation Centers were found throughout Latin America and a total of 160 (73.7%) Centers answered the questionnaire. Of these, 65.8% had private administration; 68.8% had an associated program for patients with heart disease; programs lasted an average of 24 sessions; the rehabilitation team consisted mainly of physiotherapists, physicians and dietitians; 90.6% of the centers evaluated the patients with different questionnaires; 91.9% used treadmill and 90.6% bicycle for exercises of lower limbs and 80.1% proprioceptive neuromuscular facilitation technique with weights to train the upper limbs of their patients; 55.6% had an educational program and 36.9% presented a home-based program.There has been a great increase in the number of Latin American Pulmonary Rehabilitation Centers, presenting diversity in organizational aspects.

Prognostic value of six-minute walk distance at a South American pulmonary hypertension referral center.

Six-minute walk distance (6MWD) assessment is recommended for pulmonary arterial hypertension multidimensional risk stratification. However, current 6MWD cut-off values were mainly derived from North American and European pulmonary arterial hypertension registries. Therefore, it is unknown if such cut-off values broadly apply to other geographical populations. In this study, we aimed to identify 6MWD cut-off values for Brazilian pulmonary arterial hypertension patients and to contrast our findings to current international Pulmonary Hypertension guidelines recommendations. One-hundred four consecutive pulmonary arterial hypertension patients were allocated in groups according to their 6MWD, considering 50 m as a clinically relevant 6MWD difference. Next, patients were categorized into different 6MWD ranges based on similar survival rates in each group: < 250 m, 250-400 m, and >400 m. The study outcome was all-cause mortality and transplantation according to the 6MWD range. Survival was truncated at five years. Median follow-up period was 4.35 years (0.48-5.00). Survival rates at 1, 2, 3, and 5 years were 96%, 89%, 81%, and 73%, respectively. Cox analyses adjusted for age, sex, and pulmonary arterial hypertension etiology showed that 6MWD < 250 m and >400 m were associated with higher and lower risk of all-cause mortality and transplantation. According to Harrell's c-statistic, the prognostic discrimination of the 6MWD cut-off value identified by the current study was 0.70 while international Pulmonary Hypertension guidelines 6MWD cut-offs value was 0.61. In conclusion, our findings suggest that 6MWD geographical variations should be considered when assessing risk stratification in pulmonary arterial hypertension.