The authors analyzed a nationwide database from the Uniform Data System for Medical Rehabilitation. ºÚÁϲ»´òìÈ’s Faculty Research and Development Fund provided funding to support access to this database.

Andrews and Bohannon assessed data from almost 2,000 individuals who were patients in inpatient rehabilitation facilities following the onset of Guillain-Barre Syndrome, a disease of the peripheral nervous system. They found that: 1) patients with Guillain-Barre admitted to inpatient rehabilitation require assistance with at least one if not several domains of function, motor as well as cognitive, 2) by the end of the inpatient rehabilitation stay, for each domain of function, significantly more patients attain independence, and 3) by discharge, fewer patients are independent in certain motor domains, particularly locomotion, than in others.

In other words, patients admitted to inpatient rehabilitation following the onset of Guillain-Barre need and benefit from the services provided by physical therapists and other rehabilitation professionals. However, by discharge, some of these patients still require assistance with some aspects of mobility, especially walking and climbing stairs. Therefore, some patients may benefit from continued therapy on an outpatient basis after they return home.

In the updated study, the investigators and other student research assistants sorted through 1,444 articles published in the past dozen years to identify 38 articles that contributed meaningful normal gait speed values to the database. From all combined studies, normal gait speed values obtained from 51,248 apparently healthy adults were stratified by age, sex and geographic region. These values of gait speed, a variable often referred to as a functional vital sign, will help clinicians and researchers compare their patients and research participants to a standard of walking performance.

The Journal of Physiotherapy, the official journal of the Australian Journal of Physiotherapy, has an impact factor of 10.714, placing it in the top quartile of physical therapy/rehabilitation journals.

Bill Andrews, professor in the Department of Physical Therapy Education, along with Richard Bohannon, professor emeritus at the University of Connecticut, have been notified their research study, “Functional Independence Predicts Patients with Stroke More Likely to be Discharged to the Community After Inpatient Rehabilitation: Analysis of a Nationwide Database of the United States,” has been accepted for publication in Topics in Stroke Rehabilitation.

The publication in the peer-reviewed journal Topics in Stroke Rehabilitation (Impact Factor = 2.12; CiteScore = 3.4; top quartile of rehabilitation journals) is the culmination of Andrews’ sabbatical research project that occurred during the spring of 2021. In this study, the researchers conducted a secondary analysis of the Uniform Data System for Medical Rehabilitation.

In their analysis of over 92,000 individuals who were patients in inpatient rehabilitation facilities following a stroke, the investigators found that functional independence in several domains, both at admission and discharge, were predictive of discharge destination.

In other words, patients who were more independent in self-care, locomotion, transfers, sphincter control and social cognition measures were more likely to be discharged back to the community instead of a nursing home or some other institutionalized setting. This information should help clinicians with goal setting and discharge planning when working with patients who have sustained a stroke.

Publication in the peer-reviewed journal NeuroRehabilitation (Impact Factor = 2.138) is the culmination of a multi-year project that Francis and Jaffe participated in as students at ºÚÁϲ»´òìÈ. Participants in the study were active adults who are wheelchair users secondary to a pathology or injury. In this study, the researchers determined the reliability and developed typical values for performance on a clinical measure known as the Wheelchair Propulsion Test.

Participants were asked to perform the Wheelchair Propulsion Test in various wheelchairs. Performance on the Wheelchair Propulsion Test was better in their customized, personal wheelchairs compared to a standard wheelchair or even another ultra-lightweight wheelchair. The results of this study help justify the utilization of this clinical measure by rehabilitation professionals.

​These investigators are excited to publish the results of their work substantiating the clinimetric properties of the Wheelchair Propulsion Test, especially since there is a dearth of objective measures of mobility for patients and clients who rely upon a wheelchair for locomotion. Follow-up work with the Wheelchair Propulsion Test is ongoing in collaboration with other DPT students and graduates.

​Andrews, Vallabhajosula and Ramsey are faculty members in the Department of Physical Therapy Education. Smith and Lane graduated with the DPT Class of 2017. Smith is a physical therapist with OhioHealth in Columbus, OH and Lane is a physical therapist at Wilson Medical Center in Wilson, NC.

Bill Andrews, professor of physical therapy education, recently had two articles accepted for publication in peer-reviewed journals. The first publication has a sample size of one (case report) while the second publication has a sample size of 145,664 (health services research).

Andrews co-authored a manuscript entitled “Physical Therapy for Nocturnal Lower Limb Cramping: A Case Report” with Richard Pine, a 2015 graduate of the ºÚÁϲ»´òìÈ Doctor of Physical Therapy program. The article is now published online in  and it will be published in print this fall.

Andrews has recently been notified that a manuscript entitled “Improvement During Inpatient Rehabilitation Among Older Adults with Guillain-Barré Syndrome, Multiple Sclerosis, Parkinson Disease, and Stroke” has been accepted for publication in the American Journal of Physical Medicine & Rehabilitation. He collaborated with a colleague from the University of Texas Medical Branch in Galveston on this research project. A publication date is forthcoming.

Furthermore, the article has been highlighted in PT in Motion, an online and print publication of the American Physical Therapy Association (http://www.apta.org/PTinMotion/News/2015/8/24/RehabIntensityPoststroke/).

The article is entitled Association of Rehabilitation Intensity for Stroke and Risk of Hospital Readmission. Co-investigators in this study included Dongmei Li and Janet Freburger, both with The Cecil G. Sheps Center for Health Services Research at UNC-Chapel Hill.

​Physical Therapy is the official scientific journal of the American Physical Therapy Association and it has a circulation of ~90,000. Its Impact Factor is 2.526, which ranks it #8 out of all 62 rehabilitation journals.

The study began as the result of a sabbatical Andrews was granted in 2012. The researchers accessed State Inpatient Databases which are made available to researchers through the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality. They reviewed data from 64,065 patients admitted to hospitals with a diagnosis of stroke. They found that after controlling for several factors, including illness severity, the higher the intensity of rehabilitation services provided to the patients, the lower their rate of re-admission to the hospital was. This held true for both the 30-day and the 90-day hospital readmission rates. The investigators concluded that  the results “support the contention of clinical practice guidelines that recommend patients hospitalized with an acute stroke receive rehabilitation services as soon and as much as practicable.”