Moving stroke rehabilitation research evidence to clinical practice: Consensus-based core recommendations from the Stroke Recovery and Rehabilitation Roundtable with Professor Janice Eng

In 2015 discussions began among key researchers in the field of stroke rehabilitation and recovery.  This resulted in the Stroke Recovery and Rehabilitation Roundtable who met in Philadelphia, in the USA and resulted in the publication of 6 papers in the International Journal of Stroke and the Neurorehabilitation and Neural Repair journals. We are now on the second round table and things are heating up significantly in the rehabilitation and recovery space. The second published SRRR series incorporates themes of cognitive impairment, knowledge translation, an exemplar of a next generation of stroke recovery treatment trials, kinematic and kinetic movement quantification. 

Moving research evidence to practice can take years, if not decades, which denies stroke patients and families from receiving the best care.  An international 10-member Knowledge Translation Working Group collaborated over a six month period. The process was informed from well distributed surveys to all stakeholders. From this consensus process, five of the nine identified priorities relate to service delivery (interdisciplinary care, screening and assessment, clinical practice guidelines, intensity, family support) and are generally feasible to implement or improve upon. The remaining four priorities relate to system issues (access to services, transitions in care) and resources (equipment/technology, staffing) and are acknowledged to be more difficult to implement. The taskforce recommends that health care providers, managers, and organizations determine whether the priorities identified are gaps in their local practice, and if so, consider implementation solutions to address them to improve the quality of lives of people living with stroke.

The International Journal of Stroke is the flagship publication of the World Stroke Organization. Please do consider becoming a member and help us to fight the global burden of stroke! Visit our website here

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