363P - A randomized controlled trial of mindfulness breathing exercise in patients with advanced lung cancer

Abstract

Background: Study of mindfulness breathing exercise in dyspnea reduction of patients with advanced lung cancer is lacking. Methods: This is a parallel-group, nonblinded randomized controlled trial of mindfulness breathing exercise versus placebo (best medical care alone) in patients with advanced lung cancer admitted to the respiratory unit and palliative unit of University Malaya Medical Center from 1st August 2017 to 31st March 2018. Results: A total of 34 patients were equally assigned to mindfulness breathing exercise group and control group (Table). For patients receiving mindfulness breathing exercise, 10 (58.8%) of them had reduction in modified Borg dyspnea scale (MBDS) score at 5-minutes (OR, 9.33; 95% CI, 1.80–48.38; p¼0.005) and 20-minutes (OR, 2.86; 95% CI, 0.67–12.11; p¼0.149), compared to only 3 (17.6%) and 7 (41.1%) of them in control arm at 5-minutes and 20-minutes, respectively. 5 patients (29.4%) on mindfulness breathing exercise achieved improvement in their SpO2 compare to only 2 patients (11.8%) of control arm had that at 5-minutes (OR, 3.75; 95% CI, 0.61–23.35; p¼0.209). 4 patients (23.5%) on mindfulness breathing exercise had SpO2 improvement at 20-minutes, while none in control arm had SpO2 improvement at same time. Similar number of patients had reduced respiratory rate after mindfulness breathing exercise or at control for 5-minutes [9 (52.9%) versus 10 (58.8%), (OR, 1.05; 95% CI, 0.26–4.32; p¼0.946)]. At 20-minutes, similar number of patients on mindfulness breathing exercise still had sustained reduction in respiratory rate while only 7 patients (41.1%) in control arm had similar respiratory benefit (OR, 2.14; 95% CI, 0.52–8.81; p¼0.288). Conclusions: Mindfulness breathing exercise is effective in reducing dyspnea among patients with advanced lung cancer.