Randomized-controlled Trial of Preoperative Inspiratory Muscle Training on Postoperative Complications

INSPIRA is a prospective randomized-controlled single-center trial, non-blinded The aim of this study is to assess the impact of preoperative inspiratory muscle training on postoperative overall morbidity. The question is, whether inspiratory muscle training prior to elective abdominal surgery reduces the number of post-operative complications and their severity grade. Furthermore, the impact of preoperative inspiratory muscle training on postoperative physiotherapeutic performance as surrogate of convalescence is assessed, too. Patients will be instructed by physiotherapists to perform inspiratory muscle training containing of 30 breaths twice a day for 14-18 days before surgery using Power®Breathe KHP2. Primary outcome is Comprehensive Complication Index (CCI) at 90 days after surgery. The CCI expresses morbidity on a con-tinuous numeric scale from 0 (no complication) to 100 (death) by weighing all postoperative complications according to the Clavien-Dindo classification for their respective severity.