The aim of the present study was to translate and cross-culturally adapt the Functional Status Score for the intensive care unit (FSS-ICU) into Brazilian Portuguese. This study consisted of the following steps: translation (performed by two independent translators), synthesis of the initial translation, back-translation (by two independent translators who were unaware of the original FSS-ICU), and testing to evaluate the target audience's understanding. An Expert Committee supervised all steps and was responsible for the modifications made throughout the process and the final translated version. The testing phase included two experienced physiotherapists who assessed a total of 30 critical care patients (mean FSS-ICU score = 25 ± 6). As the physiotherapists did not report any uncertainties or problems with interpretation affecting their performance, no additional adjustments were made to the Brazilian Portuguese version after the testing phase. Good interobserver reliability between the two assessors was obtained for each of the 5 FSS-ICU tasks and for the total FSS-ICU score (intraclass correlation coefficients ranged from 0.88 to 0.91). The adapted version of the FSS-ICU in Brazilian Portuguese was easy to understand and apply in an intensive care unit environment.

The lung function is identified as a predictor of time of hospitalization in heart surgery. Meanwhile sixminute walk test has been used to establish functional capacity of cardiac patients, however there are few studies that correlate it with the length of hospital stay. The aim of this research was to determine whether there is correlation of preoperative and postoperative lung function and the ability of walking during the hospital stay. A prospective cohort with 18 patients was performed, being 8 males and 10 females, with age above 40 years (medium 64.89 +/- 6.95 years). Patients where admitted for coronary artery bypass graft surgery and/or exchange valve. To characterize the pulmonary function, patients were submitted to spirometry in preoperative and the 5th postoperative day. In the latter period was also a test for 6 minutes walk (6MWT) to characterize the ability to walk. There was not significant correlation of preoperative and postoperative pulmonary function with length of hospital stay. Only the distance covered in 6MWT showed a significant negative correlation (rho= 0.62) with length of stay. The distance in 6MWT obtained a significant positive correlation with forced vital capacity (r=0.59) and first second of a maximal forced expiratory manoeuvre (r=0.52). These results suggest that patients with increased postoperative capacity to walk have a shorter time of hospitalization and it also suggest that the distance in the 6MWT can better represent the functional capacity of these patients than pulmonary function alone.