Telehealth Pulmonary Rehabilitation for Hispanic and African-American Patients Admitted With Exacerbation of COPD

Overview

Chronic Obstructive Pulmonary Disease (COPD), also known as emphysema, is the leading cause of hospitalization for older adults in the U.S., and a leading cause of death. Although there is no cure for COPD, a program called pulmonary rehabilitation (PR), which combines exercise and education, can help decrease re-hospitalizations and improve patients' quality of life. Unfortunately, very few COPD Latino and African-American patients actually get PR. These patients are unlikely to get referrals or to be able to attend PR due to lack of insurance, lack of transportation, or lack of a PR center in their area. Telehealth is a way of using computers to deliver healthcare long-distance, eliminating the need for a patient to travel to receive care. By using telehealth for PR, the patient can exercise on a stationary bike in his or her home, while being supervised by videoconference by a respiratory therapist (RT). The RT can "see" the patient, and deliver education by videoconference, and the patient can "see" the RT, so the patient does not need to leave home to get PR.

Telehealth-delivered PR has been shown to be as effective as standard PR (patients go to an outpatient setting) at improving quality of life, and patients' exercise capacity. However, this has not been studied in the Latino and African-American population and it is not known how effective telehealth PR will be among this population. For this study, the investigators hope to see if they can help COPD Latino and African-American patients with access to this needed resource through telehealth PR. They will compare standard PR and telehealth PR to determine if telehealth results in better outcomes for patients with moderate to severe COPD who were recently discharged from the hospital for COPD. The primary outcome the investigators will assess will be change in re-hospitalization rates. The secondary outcomes will include: change in quality of life, preparation to make decisions about clinical care, improved functional capacity, decreased dyspnea, anxiety, and depression. The study will involve randomly assigning participants to make sure that they are just as likely to be in one group as the other to receive either: 1) referral for telehealth-delivered PR, or 2) referral to standard (outpatient) PR. Both PR programs consist of exercise and education twice a week for 8 weeks. The investigators will give the patients surveys to complete before they start the program and at the end of the program, to see if PR had any effect on the outcomes that are being measured. Patients will also be asked to participate in a qualitative interview and focus group to learn about the barriers they encountered even after receiving a referral to PR. These qualitative interviews will be conducted among a sample of participants representing those who withdrew, were lost-to-follow-up, completed PR and decided to only complete the surveys (i.e. not participate in PR).The investigators will enroll about 276 patients - with 138 patients in each group (telehealth PR or standard PR), so they can compare outcomes to see if telehealth PR was more, less, or equally effective as standard PR.