“The change itself is relatively modest, suggesting more frequent sessions might result in greater improvements,” they wrote. For example, they said, an 8-week educational intervention delivered in the context of pulmonary rehabilitation program in one study yielded a mean change of 18.3 points on the BCKQ in the intervention group.
By contrast, the investigators found no significant difference in LINQ score changes between the intervention and control groups (P = .8).
That may indicate that two 30-minute sessions were not sufficient to attend to patients’ learning needs, authors said, though it could also have been an issue with the instrument itself in the setting of this study.
“The majority of the questions in the LINQ ask whether or not a doctor or nurse has explained a specific question to the patient,” authors explained. “Since a physiotherapist delivered the program, had the wording been altered to include physiotherapists or a more general term for healthcare professionals, we may have seen a change in these results.”
Dr. Janaudis-Ferreira and co-authors had no conflicts of interest to disclose. The study was funded by a grant from the Canadian Respiratory Health Professionals, which did not have input in research or manuscript development.
SOURCE: Janaudis-Ferreira T, et al. Chest