The effects of exercise therapy on delirium in cancer patients: a retrospective study

Abstract

Given the relatively low antipsychotic doses used, it is conceivable that delirium symptoms were attenuated in patients who received exercise therapy. This study suggests that exercise therapy may be useful as one environmental/supportive intervention for delirium.

Delirium in Older Adults

“…Maintaining orientation, decreasing environmental stimuli, increasing mobility, preventing dehydration, and monitoring medications can all be successful in decreasing length of delirium 58. Mobility seems to play a role in decreasing delirium and has been shown to decrease the amount of antipsychotic medications used in delirious patients, a measure of severity of delirium 59. Many interventions, however, have not been rigorously tested 60.…”

An integrative literature review exploring the clinical management of delirium in patients with advanced cancer

“…(). The CAM, DOS and MMSE were used in other studies (Arai et al., ; Gagnon et al., ; Tatematsu et al., ). The use of different tools means identification of delirium varied between the studies.…”

“…In terms of pharmacological interventions, the use of atypical antipsychotics reduced mean MDAS scores (Boettger & Breitbart, ; Breitbart et al., ), as did opioid rotation (Morita et al., and Moryl et al., ), a coeliac plexus block reduced the duration of terminal delirium (Arai et al., ), and methylphenidate was found to be effective in patients with hypoactive delirium (Gagnon et al., ). The one report of a nonpharmacological intervention found that the dose of antipsychotics could be reduced for patients participating in exercise therapy (Tatematsu et al., ).…”

“…Tatematsu, Hayashi, Narita, Tamaki, & Tsuboyama, : Investigated exercise therapy as an approach to reducing delirium in patients with cancer and found that the antipsychotic dose was lower in those in who received exercise therapy concluding that exercise therapy had potential as a nonpharmacological intervention for the management of delirium.…”

“…The only report of a nonpharmacological intervention located investigated the use of exercise therapy (Tatematsu et al., ). It found that antipsychotic dose was lower in the experimental group (2.198 mg) than the control group (5.533 mg) ( p < .036); however, the sample size was too small for the results to be generalisable.…”