Evaluation of Patient Experience in Inpatient Rehabilitation Setting: An Australian Perspective

This study evaluated patient experience in an Australian inpatient rehabilitation cohort in a tertiary hospital. Fifty-one consecutive patients admitted to an inpatient rehabilitation unit were recruited to evaluate their experience using the Australian Modified Client-Centred Rehabilitation Questionnaire (AM-CCRQ) across seven domains: decision-making, education, outcome evaluation, family involvement, emotional support, physical comfort, and continuity/coordination of care. Participants’ functional outcomes before and after rehabilitation were evaluated using validated Clinical Functioning Information Tool (ClinFIT) and Functional Independence Measure (FIM) tools. The median age of participants was 68 years (range 27-91), with the majority being female (54.9%). The most common conditions were orthopaedic (29.4%) and stroke (23.5%), with most participants reporting at least one issue in ClinFIT categories. Emotional support, decision-making and education AM-CCRQ domains received the highest positive ratings, while family involvement domain was rated the ‘lowest.’ The participants demonstrated significant functional improvement at discharge across ClinFIT categories and FIM subscales (p <0.001 for all). The AM-CCRQ can be a useful system-level indicator of quality and safety when used in conjunction with routine rehabilitation outcome tools.