Aqua lymphatic therapy in managing lower extremity lymphedema.

ings, continued skin care, remedial exercises, and repeated self-massage.10,11 Because lymphedema is a chronic disorder, the major shortcoming of the maintenance phase is sustaining the patient’s compliance with required preventative techniques.8,11 A novel approach to the lymphedema maintenance phase is aqua lymphatic therapy (ALT), which provides patients in the maintenance phase of lymphedema with the opportunity to treat themselves in a group setting. The program is directed by a physical therapist only once weekly. However, lymphedema must be treated on a daily basis; thus, the ALT is an active method performed entirely by the patient and not by the physical therapist. During the weekly group session, the physical therapist measures girth before and after each treatment session to monitor the effectiveness of treatment and to enable patients to track and modify their individual maintenance plans. Although aquatic therapy has been used to reduce edema in patients with musculoskeletal conditions, no researchers have studied this technique for lymphedema reduction in that population.12,13 ALT combines the inherent properties of water with self-massage, exercise, and compression to provide patients with an effective, pleasurable, and inexpensive method to control lymphedema.14 This article will describe the ALT technique using a case description of a woman with vulvar cancer.