Full-time integrated treatment program, a new system for stroke rehabilitation in Japan: comparison with conventional rehabilitation.

Objective: To validate the effectiveness of the Full-time Integrated Treatment (FIT) program that is characterized by rehabilitation 7 days/wk, encouragement of daytime activity, and enhanced communication between staff in stroke rehabilitation.

Design: Since our facility changed from the conventional rehabilitation system of 5 days of treatment to the FIT program in December 2000, we compared the conventional rehabilitation program with the FIT program at our hospital. The conventional treatment group and the FIT group consisted of 48 and 58 first-stroke hemiplegics, respectively.

Results: The motor subscore of the FIM instrument at admission and at discharge was 64.3 and 77.0 in the conventional group and 60.6 and 80.9 in the FIT group, respectively. The length of stay and efficiency of the FIM instrument were 80.0 days and 0.16 in the conventional group and 69.8 days and 0.30 in the FIT group, respectively. These differences between groups were statistically significant, with the exception of admission FIM data.

Conclusions: Because the FIT program attained a higher discharge FIM level with a shorter length of stay, the FIT program was concluded to be an efficient and effective method of stroke rehabilitation.