WASHINGTON – Patient education in the use of home oxygen halves the number of system use issues reported by patients, based on results of a survey of nearly 2,000 patients.

Pulmonary clinicians and patients report “intolerable barriers to home oxygen services,” lead researcher Susan S. Jacobs, RN, MS, said in a poster session at an international conference of the American Thoracic Society. These barriers include insufficient oxygen supply, inadequate and physically unmanageable portable options, and equipment malfunction.

In their study, Ms. Jacobs and her colleagues sought to determine the frequency and types of problems experienced by adult home oxygen users in the United States. Survey respondents were recruited via efforts by the ATS Public Advisory Roundtable. Links to the survey were posted on various patient advocacy websites, and flyers were posted at clinics and pulmonary rehabilitation programs asking patients to participate in an online, 60-item survey developed by the ATS Nursing Oxygen Working Group. Participants included 1,926 patients, but not all patients responded to every question.

“We’ve demonstrated that, if the patients are educated by a health care professional, the problems with oxygen go down, Ms. Jacobs, who is a nurse coordinator in the division of pulmonary and critical care medicine at Stanford (Calif.) University, said in an interview. “While physicians can provide oxygen for their patients, the patient oxygen education will most likely lie with the nurses and respiratory therapists.”

Of patients who responded to the survey question "Do you have oxygen problems?" 51% (899) said yes*. On average, these patients said they had experienced 3.5 types of problems with their systems.

Patients who were educated by a health care professional reported fewer problems and were more likely to report having no problems with their oxygen system. Of the patients who received oxygen therapy instruction from a health care professional, 76 (57%) did not report having any issues with their system. In contrast, of the patients who received no instruction, 116 (64%) said they had problems with their oxygen.

Most survey participants (1,113 patients) received oxygen therapy instruction from an oxygen delivery person instead of a health care professional. This group’s opinions about their oxygen systems were split, with 51% (563 patients) experiencing issues with their systems. The other 49% reported no problems.

Survey participants most frequently complained that their equipment was not working; 499 selected this response to the question, “What types of oxygen problems do you have?”

Many patients also reported being unable to spend as much time out of their homes as they wanted. This limitation resulted from their lack of access to functioning, manageable, high flow, portable oxygen systems, according to the researchers. Further, 43% of patients reported that their portable system limited their activity outside the home frequently or all of the time.

“Most of the reported problems were related to respondents not having portable systems that let them be out of their house for more than 2 to 4 hours or [to systems that] were too heavy for the patients to lift up and down their stairs and out of their cars, and they had problems operating them,” said Ms. Jacobs, who is a nurse coordinator in the division of pulmonary and critical care medicine at Stanford (Calif.) University.

The survey respondents also reported experiencing delivery problems, not being able to change the company providing them with oxygen, receiving incorrect or delayed orders from a physician, or being unable to get liquid oxygen. These responses were provided by 267, 177, 166, and 68 patients, respectively.

“There is a lot of confusion for the physicians as well as the nurses about what types of systems the patients can use [and] the pros and cons of each system. There’s lots of confusion and time spent about getting the initial orders right, getting them set up with a supplier, and ensuring the patient gets the equipment that was ordered. There is a lot of back and forth, which results in a delay to the patient, and the patients are upset because they are waiting for their oxygen supply,” she explained. “So, I think that physicians are very much wanting clarification to streamline the process and identify what patient systems are appropriate, which are high flow, [and] what their patients’ needs are to help physicians spend less time on this and help the patients get their oxygen set up in a timely manner.”

The study participants came from all 50 states and were 64 years of age on average and mostly women. A high percentage (39%) of the sample had chronic obstructive pulmonary disease, while 26% had interstitial lung diseases, 18% had pulmonary arterial hypertension, 8% had alpha-1 antitrypsin deficiency, and 4% had lymphangioleiomyomatosis.

Ms. Jacobs noted that she thought patients would benefit from greater physician knowledge of their prescribing options.

“A physician can dictate exactly what system they want. ... You can try to give [patients] a lighter system, a backpack, a smaller tank, more tanks per week, depending on their lifestyle and their needs. But physicians, a lot of times, like all of us and our patients, [are] not aware of all these choices,” she said, during the interview.

An online resource providing all of the pros and cons of the different types of portable oxygen systems that would be appropriate for physicians, nurses, and patients, as well as an examination of the quality standards of the oxygen suppliers, are needed, she noted

Ms. Jacobs reported no financial disclosures.

klennon@frontlinemedcom.com

*This article was corrected June 16, 2017

Patients report issues with home O2