The role of pre- and post rehabilitation in lung resection surgery

Pulmonary Rehabilitation (PR) is a non-pharmacologic hospital-based multidisciplinary and comprehensive intervention aimed at reducing disability of candidates. The surgical patient may per se represent a “serious” patient to be evaluated with the scope to be included in rehabilitation. Indeed, it is clear from the clinical experience that a considerable proportion of patients undergoing thoracic surgery may have a increased risk for severe postoperative pulmonary complications and/or death. Notwithstanding, relevance of PR in special conditions such as pre-post abdominal and or thoracic surgery is not widely valuable. In this review we would like to emphasize both the rationale and the activities of a pre- or post rehabilitation program dedicated to candidates to lung resection. We deal with selection of candidates, role of rehabilitation and the most popular applied techniques in this clinical area.At present PR, which is known to hasten respiratory patients’ physical performance, may be of benefit in patients who have to undergo lung resection surgery and also may improve respiratory functions in their postoperative period. However, further research is urgent in order to consider priorities of PR application in this field.