In his doctoral thesis, Erik Hulzebos argues that for patients who have bypass operations, physiotherapy before the operation clearly lowers the number of cases of pneumonia and length of hospital stay.
As a result, he believes that this physiotherapy program should be implemented as soon as possible as part of the standard care. Certainly considering the expectation that in future, patients undergoing surgery will be in increasingly poorer physical shape, this preoperative form of physiotherapy can play an important role in preventing respiratory infections.
Erik Hulzebos received his PhD from Utrecht University on December 15, 2006. The title of his thesis is, “Preoperative respiratory physical therapy in cardiac surgery.”