Reporting Guideline for RULER: Rasch Reporting Guideline for Rehabilitation Research: Explanation and Elaboration.

The Rasch Reporting Guideline for Rehabilitation Research (RULER) provides peer-reviewed, evidence-based, transparent, and consistent recommendations for reporting studies that apply Rasch Measurement (RM) Theory in a rehabilitation context. The purpose of the guideline is to ensure that authors, reviewers, and editors have uniform guidance about how to write and evaluate research on rehabilitation outcome assessments. The RULER statement includes an organizing framework and a checklist of 59 recommendations.

Rasch Reporting Guideline for Rehabilitation Research (RULER): the RULER Statement.

The application of Rasch Measurement (RM) Theory to rehabilitation assessments has proliferated in recent years. RM Theory helps design and refine assessments so that items reflect a unidimensional construct in an equal interval metric that distinguishes among persons of different abilities in a manner that is consistent with the underlying trait. Rapid growth of RM in rehabilitation assessment studies has led to inconsistent results reporting.

Initial development of a measure of evidence-informed professional thinking.

Background And Aims: A number of theories have been proposed on clinical expertise and its development in occupational therapy and allied health professions. Clinical reasoning, outcome measurement and evidence-based practice are names for leading conceptualisations. The aim of this research was to develop an operational measure of habits of mind and practice that constitute these desirable professional activities amongst professional therapists.

Toward improved evidence standards and methods for rehabilitation: recommendations and challenges.

Interventions and programs for people with disability should be based on the best--the most discriminating and rigorous--methods of systematic review and knowledge translation possible. Extant systems for systematic review and practice recommendations have excellent features but severe difficulties are encountered when attempting to apply them to disability and rehabilitation. This article identifies issues in evidence synthesis and linked practice recommendations and describes both new and long-tested methods to address them.

Developing and using evidence to improve rehabilitation practice.

The Clinical Practice Committee of the American Congress of Rehabilitation sponsored this supplement to address 2 critical, related issues for the rehabilitation field: how to develop clinical rehabilitation research to generate useful, high-quality evidence and how to use evidence to improve rehabilitation practice. The 2 are linked by the methods of evidence-based practice (EBP) used to evaluate research evidence and make recommendations for practice. Supplement authors tackle challenges, such as identifying treatment effects and how study design decisions can impact the internal and external validity of research findings, in 4 articles that describe: a 3-phase process for the development of rehabilitation treatments; small-N study designs; the design, implementation, and statistical analysis of rehabilitation clinical trials; and observational research designs used to compare the effectiveness of rehabilitation treatments.

Application of the Multicontextual Approach in Promoting Learning and Transfer of Strategy Use in an Individual with TBI and Executive Dysfunction.

The multicontext approach addresses strategy use and self-monitoring skills within activities and contexts that are systematically varied to facilitate transfer of learning. This article illustrates the application of the multicontext approach by presenting a case study of an adult who is 5 years post-traumatic brain injury with executive dysfunction and limited awareness. A single case study design with repeated pre-post measures was used.

A multicontext approach to promoting transfer of strategy use and self regulation after brain injury: An exploratory study.

Background/aim: Persons with brain injury frequently demonstrate decreased ability to monitor and apply strategies learned in treatment to everyday situations. The aim of this study is to refine, explore and provide preliminary testing of the multicontext approach in promoting strategy use across situations and increasing self-regulation, awareness and functional performance.

Methods: This study used a single-subject design with repeated measures pre- and post-intervention, with data analysed descriptively and graphically.

Towards guidelines for evaluation of measures: an introduction with application to spinal cord injury.

Background: Both clinical practice and research in spinal cord injury (SCI) continue to struggle with issues of the quality and utility of outcome measures employed. Despite widespread deference to dicta on "reliability and validity," systematic means of grading the level of evidence for measures are lacking.

Objectives: This paper explains the methods and principles for use in systematic reviews of measures in SCI.

The uniform postacute assessment tool: systematically evaluating the quality of measurement evidence.

The U.S. Congress has mandated that the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services develop a uniform assessment instrument that characterizes patients' needs for postacute services.

Treatment to improve self-awareness in persons with acquired brain injury.

Aim: To examine the effects of an awareness training protocol embedded within the practice of instrumental activities of daily living (IADLs) in participants with acquired brain injury on levels of self-awareness and functional performance.

Methods: This study used a randomized control trial design: 10 participants with moderate-to-severe brain injury received six sessions of the self-awareness training while they performed IADLs (experimental group) and 10 participants performed the same IADLs but received conventional therapeutic practice (control group). In the experimental group, participants were asked to predict their performance before each task performance and to estimate their performance level after the performance.

A natural setting behavior management program for persons with acquired brain injury: a randomized controlled trial.

Objective: To investigate the efficacy of a behavior management program delivered in the natural community setting for persons with brain injury and their caregivers.

Design: Three-group randomized controlled trial.

Setting: Homes and other community settings.

Personal and treatment factors associated with foot self-care among veterans with diabetes.

We developed and validated a survey of foot self-care education and behaviors in 772 diabetic patients with high-risk feet at eight Department of Veterans Affairs medical centers. Principal components analysis identified six subscales with satisfactory internal consistency: basic foot-care education, extended foot-care education, basic professional foot care, extended professional foot care, basic foot self-care, and extended foot self-care (alpha = 0.77-0.

The structure of functional and community outcomes following traumatic brain injury.

Objectives: To investigate the dimensionality of functional and community outcomes following serious TBI. To identify items that fit, misfit or are redundant, as well as to assess person misfit.

Methods: Rating-scale (Rasch) analysis was applied to 1-year follow-up data from 231 cases in the US National TBI Model Systems database.

Applying evidence standards to rehabilitation research.

Objective: To describe evidence grading methods employed in the systematic reviews in this special series of articles. To provide an overview of results of these reviews to critique the quality of rehabilitation research. To identify issues in the application of evidence grading methods to rehabilitation.

A trial of neuropsychologic rehabilitation in mild-spectrum traumatic brain injury.

Objective: To test the effectiveness of a neuropsychologic rehabilitation program consisting of psychotherapy and cognitive remediation in the treatment of the affective and neuropsychologic sequelae of mild-spectrum traumatic brain injury (TBI).

Design: Single-blind randomized, wait-listed controlled trial, with repeated measures and multiple baselines.

Setting: Outpatient clinic in northern New Jersey.

Health literacy, morbidity, and quality of life among individuals with spinal cord injury.

Objectives: Health literacy has been related to indicators of health outcomes in a number of populations, but not in spinal cord injury (SCI). The current study aimed to describe levels of health literacy in SCI and to investigate its possible associations with morbidity, health-related quality of life, functional independence, community participation, and life satisfaction.

Design: Cross-sectional survey of 107 community-living people with SCI recruited in a New Jersey outpatient SCI center.

Preventive services and health behaviors among people with spinal cord injury.

Background/objective: To document receipt of certain understudied preventive services and health behaviors in spinal cord injury (SCI) and to compare them to the general adult population.

Methods: Cross-sectional survey.

Participants: One hundred ninety-nine community-living adults with SCI residing in New Jersey.

Community activities and individuals' satisfaction with them: quality of life in the first year after traumatic brain injury.

Objective: To investigate the relations between community activities and satisfaction with these activities, desires to change them, and global life satisfaction.

Design: Interview study with follow-up 1 month after rehabilitation discharge and 12 months postinjury.

Setting: Community.

Perceived quality of care and outcomes following spinal cord injury: minority status in the context of multiple predictors.

Objective: To determine whether patients with spinal cord injury (SCI) who are members of minority groups experience a disadvantage with regard to quality of care, and investigate predictors of perceived quality of care and indicators of outcome.

Design: Correlational analysis of longitudinal data.

Sample: One hundred and forty-three individuals with SCI in the first year following injury (43.

The effects of physician empathy on patient satisfaction and compliance.

The present study attempted to develop new scales of patient-perceived, empathy-related constructs and to test a model of the relationships of physician empathy and related constructs to patient satisfaction and compliance. Five hundred fifty outpatients at a large university hospital in Korea were interviewed with the questionnaire. The data were analyzed using structural equation modeling.

Relationships between level of disability and receipt of preventive health services.

Objectives: To examine relationships between level of disability and receipt of certain preventive health services, including demographic and systems variables that may explain or confound these relationships.

Design: Analysis of recent (1998 and 2000) data from the Behavioral Risk Factor Surveillance System, a nationwide telephone survey.

Setting: States reporting data on disability (13 in 1998, 18 in 2000).

Structured exercise improves calf muscle pump function in chronic venous insufficiency: a randomized trial.

Objective: Deterioration of calf muscle pump function is associated with progression of chronic venous insufficiency (CVI). We postulated that a supervised exercise program would improve calf muscle strength and venous hemodynamics in patients with CVI.

Methods: We recruited 31 patients for this randomized, prospective trial.

Telerehabilitation, cognition and user-accessibility.

Survivors of traumatic brain injury (TBI) often experience cognitive and physical impairments. The aims of this study were to: 1) build an internet-based, "Virtual Rehabilitation Center" (VRC) that provides rehabilitation, education and support services to individuals with TBI; and 2) to determine the relationships between the nature and severity of the participants' cognitive impairments and their ability to use the VRC. Eight individuals with brain injuries (Age: M=43, SD=15.

Characteristics of effective and efficient rehabilitation programs.

Objective: To investigate the characteristics of rehabilitation hospitals and units correlated with gains in motor and cognitive function, after adjusting for case severity of the patients admitted and for length of stay (LOS).

Design: The Uniform Data System for Medical Rehabilitation (UDSMR) database was first analyzed to develop a method of adjusting for patient case severity on admission. Rehabilitation programs were surveyed to assess characteristics commonly thought to be associated with efficiency and effectiveness.