BACKGROUND: Patients who undergo pulmonary rehabilitation programs also participate in an educational program with classes covering matters related to their disease and treatment. Such programs aim to provide patients with the knowledge needed for them to be able to deal with their disease and its repercussions. OBJECTIVE: To evaluate whether the educational program applied to patients undergoing pulmonary rehabilitation has effective results regarding their learning. METHOD:This was a prospective study involving 22 patients who underwent a pulmonary rehabilitation program. Their mean age was 63 years (SD ± 11.8). Initially, a questionnaire developed and validated by the Pulmonary Rehabilitation Center of UNIFESP/LESF was applied to evaluate the patients' knowledge about the disease before and after the educational intervention. The patients were divided into two groups: one with the educational program and the other serving as a control group (no educational program). The educational program group answered the questionnaire twice (before and after the intervention), and the control group answered only once. RESULTS:The patients who underwent the educational program presented an increase in the percentage of correct answers, from before to after the intervention (69% versus 84%, respectively), and a decrease in the percentage of mistakes, from before to after the intervention (20% versus 14%, respectively). CONCLUSION: The educational program applied to patients in the pulmonary rehabilitation program was effective to increase the patients' knowledge about their disease, its consequences and its treatment.
COPD; education; rehabilitation; physical therapy
