Factors Associated With Acceptance of Home-Based Pulmonary Telerehabilitation in COPD

ACCEPT-TELEREHAB is a single-center retrospective observational cohort study based on data collected during screening for the TELEREHAPP feasibility study (ClinicalTrials.gov identifier NCT05314686). The source cohort comprises all individuals with COPD who were screened and considered potentially eligible for an 8-week home-based pulmonary telerehabilitation program at ADIR Association between May 2024 and April 2025. Participants will be classified according to the decision recorded at screening: acceptance or refusal of the proposed telerehabilitation program. Data will be extracted from the original screening file, medical records, and information available from the pulmonary rehabilitation referral and assessment. Variables of interest include age, sex, body mass index, COPD severity, comorbidities, available pulmonary function and exercise-test data, long-term oxygen therapy, dyspnea, quality of life, psychological status, functional exercise capacity, previous pulmonary rehabilitation, and the setting of any previous pulmonary rehabilitation program. When a reason for declining participation was documented, it will be coded retrospectively into descriptive categories; more than one category may be assigned to a single participant. Home-to-center distance and estimated travel time will be derived using a standardized mapping procedure. The residential address available at screening will be used to calculate the fastest car journey to ADIR Association for a standardized arrival time of 9:00 AM on a working Tuesday outside public holidays and school vacations. Continuous variables will be summarized using means and standard deviations or medians and interquartile ranges, as appropriate. The acceptance and refusal groups will be compared using independent-samples t tests or Wilcoxon-Mann-Whitney tests for continuous variables and chi-square or Fisher exact tests for categorical variables. Differences will be reported with 95% confidence intervals. Refusal to participate will be the dependent variable in univariable and multivariable logistic regression models. Results will be reported as odds ratios with 95% confidence intervals.