Article

Cancer rehabilitation is an important but often underutilized
treatment in the comprehensive care of the cancer patient. Cancer patients have
varying levels of access to rehabilitation services. Acute inpatient, inpatient
consultation-based, and outpatient-based cancer rehabilitation services have been
described in the literature. We will discuss acute inpatient cancer
rehabilitation and some of its outcomes at the University of Texas MD Anderson
Cancer Center in Houston, TX, which is the only national comprehensive cancer
center to have its own acute inpatient rehabilitation unit dedicated solely to
cancer patients. DESIGN: We retrospectively reviewed the inpatient medical
records of consecutive inpatients admitted to the acute inpatient cancer
rehabilitation unit from September 2008 to August 2009 for the following
information: patient age, sex, primary tumor type, rehabilitation diagnoses,
length of stay, discharge destination, and payer source. RESULTS: From September
2008 to August 2009, the physical medicine and rehabilitation service at MD
Anderson Cancer Center had 1098 inpatient consultations, of which 427 patients
were admitted to the inpatient rehabilitation unit with a mean length of stay of
11 days. Of the 427 patients, 73 (17%) were patients with primary
neurologic-based tumor, 71 (16%) were patients with hematologic-based tumors, 48
(11%) were sarcoma patients, 35 (8%) were gastrointestinal tumor patients, 27
(6%) were head and neck tumor patients, 25 (6%) were prostate and bladder cancer
patients, 24 (6%) were lung cancer patients, 22 (5%) were melanoma patients, 20
(5%) were breast cancer patients, 15 (4%) were renal cancer patients, 14 (3%)
were gynecologic cancer patients, and 53 (12%) were patients with other types of
cancer. Of the 427 patients admitted to acute inpatient rehabilitation at MD
Anderson Cancer Center, 324 (76%) were discharged home, 72 (17%) went back to
acute care service, 15 (4%) were sent to a skilled nursing facility, 9 (2%) were
discharged to palliative care, and 5 (1%) were discharged to a long-term acute
care facility. CONCLUSIONS: An active inpatient rehabilitation unit within a
national comprehensive cancer center receives referrals from patients with a wide
variety of tumor types and is able to successfully discharge home 76% of its
patients.

Langue : ANGLAIS