Open AccessPrehabilitation May Help Mitigate an Increase in COVID-19 Peripandemic Surgical Morbidity and Mortality
Author(s) -
Julie K. Silver
Publication year - 2020
Publication title -
american journal of physical medicine and rehabilitation
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.701
H-Index - 101
eISSN - 1537-7385
pISSN - 0894-9115
DOI - 10.1097/phm.0000000000001452
Subject(s) - prehabilitation , medicine , pandemic , psychological intervention , rehabilitation , covid-19 , social distance , health care , intensive care medicine , incidence (geometry) , medline , physical therapy , nursing , disease , physics , economic growth , infectious disease (medical specialty) , optics , economics , political science , law
As physicians specializing in rehabilitation medicine consider sequelae from the novel coronavirus pandemic that began in 2019, one issue that should be top of mind is the physiologic effect that large-scale social distancing had on the health of patients in general but, more specifically, on preoperative patients who had their surgeries delayed or will have newly scheduled procedures during the peripandemic period. Predictably, as the virus becomes less prevalent, there will be a tremendous motivation to move forward with scheduling operations from both patient care and institutional perspectives. However, one can anticipate a pandemic-related increase in surgical morbidity and mortality above prepandemic levels, particularly in older or medically frail patients even if they did not have a novel coronavirus (i.e., COVID-19) infection. Therefore, now is the time to consider for patients awaiting surgery a wider adoption of prehabilitation-physical and psychological assessments that establish a baseline functional level, identify impairments, and provide interventions that promote physical and psychological health to reduce the incidence and/or severity of future impairments.