A Randomized, Open-label, Controlled Trial on Perioperative Rehabilitation of Cardiac Valvular Surgery

The PORT study is a randomized, open-label, controlled trial using assessor blinding and intention-to-treat analysis. To date, no high-quality study has prospectively examined the impact of perioperative CR in the Chinese population undergoing cardiac surgery. Thus, the PORT trial has been designed to address a cardiac rehabilitation study in line with the actual situation in China. The investigators have used the Standard Protocol Items: Recommendations for Intervention Trials (SPIRIT) guidelines in reporting this clinical trial.

Eligible patients are invited to a face-to-face meeting to confirm study eligibility and introduce the study objectives. The screened candidates will sign the written informed consent after they confirm their willingness to participate. Baseline data are collected subsequently. Then, the intervention group will receive perioperative rehabilitation interventions targeted at the optimization of the postoperative outcomes, This specialized approach, the PORT protocol, contains four key elements: education, inspiratory muscle training (IMT), active cycle of breathing techniques (ACBT), and early mobilization (EM). Patients will be evaluated during hospitalization for study outcomes and 3 months after surgery.

After collection of baseline data, central randomization is conducted on a web-based interface (http://crdms.echobelt.org/) using a computer-generated randomized treatment allocation schedule. The randomization is stratified based on patients' age (<60, 60-75, and >75 years), left ventricular ejection fraction (<40%, 40%-50%, and >50%), and lung function (GOLD stage 1, 2, 3 and 4) with a permuted scheme with blocks of varying sizes, which is concealed from the investigators to avoid selection bias. Thus, neither investigators and patients nor relatives can influence the group the patients are allocated. Personal information about potential and enrolled patients will be collected electronically and shared in a database accessible only within the project group for those responsible for patient inclusion, in order to protect confidentiality before, during, and after the trial.

The investigators are performing a randomized trial stating that the mean in the intervention and the control groups are the same with a power of 95%, and a type I error probability of 5%. Data from the pilot study (to be submitted) showed that the incidence in the primary endpoint was 13.56% (intervention group) versus 21.21% (control group). The inclusion of 400 participants is needed in the experimental intervention group, and 400 in the control group (a total of 800 participants) to be able to reject the null hypothesis. The trial will randomly allocate 800 patients, 1:1 intervention to the control group, using central randomization, blinded outcome assessment, and statistical analyses. The intervention consists of education, inspiratory muscle training (IMT), active cycle of breathing techniques (ACBT), and early mobilization (EM), intervention versus treatment as usual, with blinded outcome assessment.