Investigator: H.F. Machiel Van der Loos, PhD Project Staff: Charles G. Burgar, MD; Eric L. Topp, MS; Deborah E. Kenney, MS OTR; and Ellie L. Buckley, MS PT Project Category: Stroke - 2000 Objectives: For people who have become hemiplegic as a result of a stroke, a critical safety-related retraining area for physical functions is wheelchair transfers. In addition, to incorporate the relatively unsupervised home care into the rehabilitation process, clinicians require a better means to assess functional gains and provide effective training tools. To fill these two needs, our goal is to develop a personalized training and clinical assessment instrument based on the 1996 Video-Based F-PAT (Functional Performance Assessment and Training) VA-funded Pilot Study, which relies on the manipulation of digitized videoclips. Our current development objectives are (1) to enhance the pilot F-PAT web site to allow clinicians password-protected access to the digitized video and assessment information; and (2) to train an Occupational Therapist collaborator to create the personalized videotapes for patients to take home with them. Our clinical objective is to implement a 2-year evaluation of the F-PAT design concept with 45 subjects, divided in 3 groups, who as patients undergo acute rehabilitation at the VA Comprehensive Rehabilitation Center and are discharged to their homes or a sub-acute facility. This study has the dual goal of evaluating the effectiveness of the personalized training videotapes and the effectiveness of the video-based assessment methodology. Methods: The study will divide the subjects into three treatment groups to compare the effectiveness of accepted practice, generic videotape, and personalized videotape home-based instruction for clients and care providers. Comparison of outcomes will be done using videotape of task performance before release from the acute therapy program and at the follow-up evaluation one month later. The subjects will be evaluated by a blinded physiatrist viewing digitized videoclips of task performance. This study will determine if personalized videoclip-based instructional material is effective, and if videoclip comparisons by a clinician is an effective diagnosis and assessment instrument. This study will be conducted at a VA hospital clinic with veterans. Given the high prevalence of stroke in the general population as well, no difference is expected between veteran and non-veteran subjects, leading to an expectation of generalizability of the results of this research to the health care community at large. Publications: D. Shafer, H.F.M. Van der Loos, Integrated video and computerized functional assessment. Proceedings RESNA'95, Vancouver, BC, Canada, June, 1995, pp. 146-148. D. Shafer, H.F.M. Van der Loos, Individualized video-based stroke rehabilitation home program. Proceedings RESNA'96, Salt Lake City, UT, June, 1996, pp. 89-91. Related Work:
Funding Source: VA RR&D Merit Review |
