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Rural inpatient rehabilitation by specialist outreach: comparison with a city unit
Malcolm Bowman1, Steven Faux, Stephen Wilson
1Department of Rehabilitation Medicine, St Vincent's Hospital, Darlinghurst, New South Wales, Australia. mbowman@stvincents.com.au
Objective:
To examine the effectiveness of a rural inpatient rehabilitation service provided by specialist outreach, and to compare outcomes with a large inner city unit.
Design:
Descriptive study using health service outcome data.
Setting:
Rural base hospital and inner city tertiary referral centre.
Participants:
A total of 329 patients (234 city and 95 rural) admitted for inpatient rehabilitation.
Main Outcome Measures:
Length of hospital stay, Functional Independence Measure, discharge destination.
Results:
Functional Independence Measure gain per week was 5.4 for the rural outreach unit, compared with 5.5 for the city unit. Length of stay was shorter for the rural unit, with a higher proportion of patients discharged to nursing home.
Conclusions:
Similar rates of functional improvement are achievable with rural inpatient rehabilitation provided by specialist outreach compared with a large inner city unit. Local factors probably account for the shorter length of stay in the rural unit.
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