MET strives to deliver optimal improvements for our patients and clients. Optimal improvement is defined as:
- Achieving improvements in 4 outcome domains which,
- Are meaningful (such as an improvement equal or greater than the MDC and/or MID), and
- Result in reduced risk for recurrence; improved community independence; and overall healthier individuals.
This third criteria is illustrated in a recent article of Van Onsem and colleagues who identified two outcome measures, range of motion (from the impairment outcome domain) and 6-min walk test (from the objective performance domain) which can predict patient satisfaction with TKA. A cluster of patients whose Improvements were beyond the pre-surgical level are 6–8 times more likely of being satisfied after TKA.
This illustrates the need for clinician not only to strive for normalization but also for optimization.
Van Onsem S et al. Improved walking distance and range of motion predict patient satisfaction after TKA. Knee Surg Sports Traumatol Arthrosc. 2018 Feb 8.
About the Author:
Becky Alwood
CEO, MET Brands
OTR/L, CLT
Becky is the CEO of the MET brands. She served as the corresponding author of Inter-rater Reliability of Sustained Aberrant Movement Patterns as a Clinical Assessment of Muscular Fatigue (2016) published in The Open Orthopaedics Journal and she co-authored textbook Hand-Held Dynamometry: Guidelines for Daily Clinical Practice (2018). Becky has 15 years of experience as an occupational therapist including outpatient occupational therapy, hospital-based rehabilitation department management, and adjunct faculty at Andrews University. In 2011, Becky was chosen as one of the American Occupational Therapy Association Emerging Leaders in Middle Management and served as the Editor of the Administration and Management Special Interest Section of AOTA from 2013-2014. She is a graduate of the University of New Hampshire (2002) and the University of Indianapolis (2009).