Increased Relative Functional Gain and Improved Stroke Outcomes: A Linked Registry Study of the Impact of Rehabilitation.

Objectives: It is unclear how acute care influences patient outcomes in those who receive rehabilitation. We aimed to determine the associations between acute stroke therapies, outcomes during inpatient rehabilitation and self-reported outcomes at 90-180 days after stroke.

Materials And Methods: Patient-level data from adults with acute stroke registered in the Australian Stroke Clinical Registry (AuSCR, 2014-2017) were linked with data from the Australasian Rehabilitation Outcomes Centre (AROC). The main outcome was relative function gain (RFG), which is a measure of the FIM change achieved between admission to discharge as a proportion of the total gain possible based on admission FIM, relative to the maximum achievable score. Multilevel logistic/median regression analyses were used to investigate the association between RFG achieved in rehabilitation and (1) acute stroke therapies; (2) 90-180 day outcomes (health-related quality of life using EuroQoL-5D-3L; independence according to modified Rankin Scale (score 0-2) and self-reported hospital readmission).

Results: Overall, 8397/8507 eligible patients from the AuSCR were linked with corresponding AROC data (95% linkage rate; median age 75 years, 43% female); 4239 had 90-180 days survey data. Receiving thrombolysis (16% of the cohort) had a minimal association with RFG in rehabilitation (coefficient: 0.03; 95% Confidence Interval [CI]: 0.01, 0.05). Greater RFG achieved whilst in in-patient rehabilitation was associated with better longer-term HR-QoL (coefficient 21.77, 95% CI 17.8, 25.8) including fewer problems with mobility, self-care, pain, usual activities and anxiety/depression; greater likelihood of independence (adjusted Odds Ratio: 10.66; 95% CI 7.86, 14.45); and decreased odds of self-reported hospital readmission (adjusted Odds Ratio: 0.53; 95% CI 0.41, 0.70) within 90-180 days post-stroke.

Conclusions: Stroke survivors who achieved greater RFG during inpatient rehabilitation had better HR-QoL and were more likely to be independent at follow-up. Acute care processes did not appear to impact RFG or long-term outcomes for those who accessed inpatient rehabilitation.