Background: Gamification and social incentives, such as family/peer engagement in goal-setting and feedback, are increasingly used by employers and health plans to promote physical activity and lose weight in outpatient settings but these approaches have not been used to improve mobility and reduce hospital-associated functional decline after hospital discharge. Methods: 12-week randomized, controlled trial of [...]

Background: Many hospitalized patients spend most of their admission laying in their hospital beds. This can lead to in-hospital complications such as skeletal muscle atrophy, bedsores, and venous thromboembolism. In-hospital decline in ability to perform ADLs is associated with need for post-acute facility placement and readmission. We aimed to increase the percentage of patients admitted [...]

Background: Bed-rest is considered essential to recovery. Functional decline in older patients is an often-overlooked riskfactor during hospitalizations. Older patients have higher 30-day readmission rates, more complications,and longer lengths of stay. Increasing the amount of walking in the hospital has been identified as a potentialsolution, with 900 steps per day identified as a target to [...]

Background: Older adults commonly lose mobility during hospitalization. This loss of mobility may be preventable if it is identified and addressed early in a patient’s hospital course. However, currently there is no systematic method to identify these patients early, and current practices are guided by physician experience and intuition. To this end, we used machine [...]

Background: As the aging population with multiple comorbidities continues to grow in our country, appropriate resource utilization and efficiency of care remain a priority for many acute care facilities to reduce hospital acquired debility, healthcare costs, and improve patient experience. The physical therapist’s assessment of the patient’s functional capacity plays a crucial role in discharge [...]

Background: When used optimally, technology should serve as a tool for clinicians, not an obstacle. Yet according to a recent study by the Mayo Clinic, Electronic Health Records (EHR) score in the bottom nineth percentile of technologies when evaluated for usability. This lack of usability can lead to increased documenting times, workflow bottlenecks, and physician [...]

Background: Hospital readmissions within 30 days of discharge have gained national attention and account for more than $17 billion in avoidable U.S. Medicare expenditures each year. (1) In 2011 alone, there were approximately 3.3 million adult 30-day all-cause hospital readmissions, costing the US $41.3 billion.(2) As such, efforts have been made to create algorithms to [...]