Demographic mapping and characterization of physical therapy care profile offered in Neonatal Intensive Care Units in the City of Rio de Janeiro, Brazil

ABSTRACT This study aims to map and characterize the profile of physical therapy care offered in intensive care units (ICU) of public and private hospitals in the city of Rio de Janeiro. To this end, a cross-sectional study was conducted by interviews with the heads/routine chiefs of physical therapy services of the hospitals in the city of Rio de Janeiro with neonatal ICU (NICU) from January 2013 to January 2015. The questions comprised the distribution of working hours, organization and institutional location, time of experience in the area, types of physical therapy techniques and resources used. Twenty seven hospitals (17 public and 10 private) were studied as follows: 6 hospitals in the South area of the city, 8 in the North, 8 in the West and 5 in the central area and port area. The total number of physical therapists of the teams was 141, and 59% of them were experts in neonatal intensive care. With regard to the heads/routine chiefs, 16 (59%) were specialists in neonatal intensive care and 21 (79%) had more than five years of experience. Various physical therapy techniques were cited as: motor physical therapy, chest vibration and thoracic-abdominal rebalance. According to the results, there was not a single standard regarding routines, protocols, professional organization and training, and techniques used. In addition, it was found that the physical therapy in ICUs was not held full-time, neither provided the three shifts care.