Use of outpatient physical therapy services by people with musculoskeletal conditions

Because musculoskeletal conditions contribute to functional decline and activity limitation, physical therapy intervention may be an appropriate health care resource. The purpose of this research was to identify determinants of outpatient physical therapy use by people with musculoskeletal conditions.

The subjects were adult noninstitutionalized civilians who participated in the Medical Expenditure Panel Survey from 1996 to 2000 and who had at least one musculoskeletal condition (N=18,546).

Logistic regression was used to identify predisposing, need, and enabling variables associated with receiving outpatient physical therapy services.

Factors that were positively associated with receiving physical therapy services were having more than one musculoskeletal condition, having some limitation in function, having 7 or more ICD-9 (International Classification of Diseases, 9th Revision) codes, having a college or advanced degree, and residing in an urban area. Factors that were negatively associated with receiving physical therapy services were being older than 65 years of age, having no high school degree, Hispanic ethnicity, African-American race, having public insurance or no insurance, and living in any US census region besides the Northeast.

The results of this study indicate that health- and non-health-related factors influence outpatient physical therapy use.