Online rehab program for rural lung patients to expand across Maritimes

Carolyn Ray · CBC

· Posted: May 26, 2025 5:00 AM EDT | Last Updated: 7 hours ago

When Lily MacDonald archetypal signed successful to an online workout league for women with COPD, she was definite she wasn't going to similar it. She couldn't ideate doing an effectual workout astatine her room table.

"At archetypal I thought, 'How tin I exercise, what americium I going to do?'" said MacDonald, who lives successful Glace Bay, N.S. 

She was 1 of the archetypal participants successful a aviator task to connection virtual carnal rehabilitation to lung patients successful agrarian parts of the province.

The task went truthful well it volition grow crossed the Maritimes this fall.

"I felt great, I truly did," MacDonald said. "As it happens, you unrecorded by yourself, you person nary motivation, but I started backmost into exercising."

Nova Scotia Health estimates that 86,000 radical — oregon 13 per cent of the population — person chronic obstructive pulmonary disease, which is often caused by vulnerability to smoke. Those rates are immoderate of the highest successful the country.

That disquieted Carley O'Neill, an adjunct prof successful Acadia University's kinesiology programme and a objective workout physiologist. She says COPD patients often kick of being retired of breath.

"Exercise tin truly assistance to trim that symptom," she said. "That's truly going to assistance dilatory the complaint of progression for this condition."

Living successful Wolfville, O'Neill saw the limitations of rehab programs that were constricted to those who could be in-person.

She said a batch of radical successful agrarian areas were not getting the enactment they needed due to the fact that they couldn't get to class.

She worked with 1 of her students, Amanda Daniels, and the 2 launched a virtual class. They offered it to astir 50 women crossed the province. The participants ranged successful property from 43 to 86.

"We wanted to commencement tiny earlier we upscale it to spot what we could do," she said.

The women were divided into tiny groups and met online doubly a week to enactment retired from home.

They were mailed packages that included workout bands and pulse oximeters, tiny devices that show oxygen levels passim the workout.

Then they were encouraged to usage tiny weights.

Daniels suggested lifting crockery cans oregon h2o bottles if they didn't person thing else. The cardinal was that the programme needed to beryllium free, truthful outgo wouldn't bounds participation.

Daniels, who is from Labrador City, N.L., knows each excessively good however hard it is to get attraction successful agrarian areas, truthful she was anxious to enactment the women.

"Many of them unrecorded alone," she said. "Many of them don't person household members adjacent to assistance attraction for them. Some of them are frightened to spell to the market store due to the fact that they consciousness excessively breathless to locomotion astir the store oregon get retired for a locomotion oregon thing similar that.

"Being capable to beryllium astatine location and speech to people, it's life-changing for them."

This wasn't MacDonald's archetypal effort astatine a rehabilitation program. She participated successful Membertou a fewer years ago, but she could nary longer get a thrust erstwhile the classes moved to Sydney River.

MacDonald was self-conscious astir going online, but she rapidly came to emotion the Zoom meetings.

"If you were precocious signing in, they would either telephone you or buzz you … because you knew idiosyncratic was retired determination who was going to attraction if you were determination oregon not," she said.

"It's the accessibility. Just to beryllium capable to get up retired of bed, get acceptable and beryllium successful beforehand of the assemblage and you're successful class."

This was the payment that Carley O'Neill and Amanda Daniels didn't expect.

While the programme is intended to assistance someone's carnal health, they loved that it besides helped people's intelligence health.

"Oftentimes what they accidental they've enjoyed the astir has been the assemblage and the friendships they build, which … hurts my bosom a small spot due to the fact that I'm an workout physiologist and the workout isn't truly what's wooing them," said O'Neill. "But it's been a truly affirmative outcome."

O'Neill has present received a caller assistance from the Lung Association of Nova Scotia and Prince Edward Island. Classes successful the autumn volition unfastened up to radical of each genders and successful the 3 Maritime provinces.

She'll bash a feasibility survey connected the project, and she's hoping it volition yet beryllium a imperishable enactment for lung patients crossed agrarian Canada.