[Therapy goals in medical rehabilitation]

The definition of appropriate and measurable goals for treatment is a fundamental quality feature of medical practice. In co-operation with experts, we developed a catalogue of therapy goals for medical rehabilitation. In a two-stage procedure we first analyzed the target definitions that are currently used in medical rehabilitation. In a second step we used these targets as input for expert panels. Based on a modified model of the WHO classification ICIDH, the goals were defined on four dimensions: somatic, functional, psychosocial and educative. The established goals are relevant and measurable. Nevertheless, there is still a lack of adequate and sound measurement procedures for many goals. Therefore, there is an urgent need for further research in this field.