Barriers to achieving evidence-based stroke rehabilitation

To determine the perceived barriers to evidence-based practice by health professionals working within the field of stroke rehabilitation.

Focus groups were carried out to identify the perceived barriers; these were followed by a postal questionnaire that asked stroke rehabilitation professionals to rate their agreement with the perceived barriers.

One hundred and five stroke rehabilitation professionals participated in the focus groups and were sent the postal questionnaire. Eighty-six responses were returned, from 27 physiotherapists, 26 occupational therapists, 22 nurses, 6 speech and language therapists, and 5 other professionals.

Proportion of subjects rating their level of agreement with statements as 1 'agree', 2, 3, 4 or 5 'disagree'. Scores of 1 or 2 were classified as 'agreement', and scores of 4 or 5 were classified as 'disagreement': the percentages of subjects agreeing or disagreeing with each statement were calculated.

Twenty barriers were identified, classified under the headings 'ability', 'opportunity' and 'implementation'. Seventy-nine (92%) of all respondents agreed that keeping up to date with research findings was important to them, but only 7 (8%) were happy with the time that they had to do this. Fifty-eight (67%) perceived a need for further training. Only 4 (5%) agreed that it was easy to transfer research findings into their daily practice. A number of significant differences were found between the perceived barriers of different disciplines.