There was no difference between the effect of late- and early-initiated exercise intervention .
Exercise has a small-to-moderate effect at short-term follow-up on exercise capacity and the physical component of health-related quality of life in patients operated for lung cancer .
The long-term effects of exercise capacity are unknown .
Early-initiated exercise programmes ( 2 weeks post-operation ) did not show an effect on exercise capacity .
OBJECTIVE To review the evidence concerning the effects of  postoperative exercise interventions  on exercise capacity and health-related quality of life  following resection for non-small cell lung cancer , and to review whether different initiation times of exercise produce different effects on exercise capacity .
Post-operative rehabilitation for surgically resected non-small cell lung cancer patients: serial pulmonary functional analysis.
INTRODUCTION Post-operative pulmonary rehabilitation in patients who have undergone surgery for lung cancer is a subject of open debate . Clinical practice in this setting is based on the results of observational trials , such as the one described here . Prospect i ve r and omized controlled trials have been registered and recruitment is ongoing . METHODS From 2005 to 2008 , 110 patients with surgical non-small cell lung cancer were entered into a post-operative inpatient pulmonary rehabilitation programme for 3 weeks . All patients were evaluated for pulmonary function after surgery ( time 0 ; T0 ) and at the end of pulmonary rehabilitation programme ( time 1 ; T1 ) . Statistical analysis focused on improvement in pulmonary function parameters and physical performance in the 6-min walking test ( 6MWT ) . Mixed models multiple linear regression was used to identify parameters related to the primary end-points of this research . RESULTS Patients ' mean age was 70.1 years ( st and ard deviation ( SD ) 8.5 years ) ; male/female ratio 73/37 . A total of 94 patients underwent lobectomy , 8 underwent pneumonectomy , and the remaining 8 underwent bilobectomy . Among the analysed parameters a significant improvement could be detected only with regards to the 6MWT ( 257.4 ( SD 112.2 ) at T0 and 382.8 ( SD 11.09 ) at T1 ) . CONCLUSION Post-operative pulmonary rehabilitation in patients with surgical non-small cell lung cancer is effective in terms of exercise tolerance
There was no difference between the effect of late- and early-initiated exercise intervention .
Exercise has a small-to-moderate effect at short-term follow-up on exercise capacity and the physical component of health-related quality of life in patients operated for lung cancer .
The long-term effects of exercise capacity are unknown .
Early-initiated exercise programmes ( 2 weeks post-operation ) did not show an effect on exercise capacity .
OBJECTIVE To review the evidence concerning the effects of  postoperative exercise interventions  on exercise capacity and health-related quality of life  following resection for non-small cell lung cancer , and to review whether different initiation times of exercise produce different effects on exercise capacity .