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Evidence-Based Practice
Bristol Hospital is a community hospital with approximately 130 licensed beds in Bristol, CT with an active Total Knee Replacement(TKR) program. In 2024, the TKR surgery team announced their planned change from incision closure with staples to mesh and glue** due to some surgery team members having prior successful experiences with this technique however, none of the Rehab team had any experiences with this product. There were many discussions in Rehab about potential concerns regarding patient care. Some topics included incisional integrity during therapy with general functional mobility, standard flexion/extension exercises, as well as integrity concerns after discharge to home where there is less supervision/assistance. The purpose of this project was to determine if 1 year out from this change if therapy staff had any differences in their concern levels.
Methods:
We surveyed PT/OT staff using a 5 question 0-10 point Lickert-type rating scale regarding their concerns from the announcement 1 year prior and their concerns post implementation with 0 indicating no concerns and 10 indicating significant concerns. All 6 eligible therapists chose to participate.
Results:
Therapists’ average concern ratings across the time frame decreased from a rating of 6.9 prior to working with any of them to 2.0 as self-reported on the survey tool 1 year out indicating a significant decrease in concerns regarding incisional integrity after working with this population for a year potentially reflecting a lack of incisional issues with standard PT/OT post operatively.
Discussion:
The value in this project revolves around therapy and orthopedics continuing to work collaboratively to continue to improve patient outcomes and patient satisfaction as we move to shorter in-hospital stays for TKR patients. We plan to continue to collaborate using data with the orthopedic team using the therapy/functional point of view.