As the population with untreated blood pressure and other stroke-prone factors is rising, it is anticipated that there will be an increase in the prevalence of hospitalization for stroke. This, in turn, will put an enormous burden on existing health care resources and rehabilitation cost for each stroke survivor may further shoot up.
Stroke survivors who get admitted to specialized centers usually start their rehabilitation as soon as they are medically stabilized. Depending on individual’s post-stroke needs, rehab program includes physical therapy and speech therapy for relearning forgotten motor and speech functions. For stroke survivors who are seeking out for cost-effective rehab solution, the gap between expectation and fulfillment has already started widening. 9zest Stroke Rehab is an initiative to fill out these gaps.
As part of our user feedback exercise, we gather feedback from stroke patients who use our solution. What we learned from the feedback strengthened our belief that the 9zest solution has potential to make a huge difference in stroke rehabilitation and share the load of existing healthcare facilities.
One of our users had undergone post-stroke therapy in the hospital, rehab center, at-home visits, and then as an outpatient. She started using 9zest solution after her outpatient therapy ended. She has made a remarkable improvement in her condition with the help of 9zest Stroke Rehab. She felt that the tele-rehab solution could have made her recovery faster even before she finished her outpatient therapy in following ways:
In the Hospital Facility
Stroke survivors often feel that occupational therapist spend very little time with them during their hospital stay or in the rehab center. The therapist assigns them an activity and then attends to other patients. She felt that it would have been more effective if the occupational therapist had configure her protocol using the 9zest app. Even though she did not have speech issue, a stroke survivor with speech issues could resolve same challenges.
Though she did not have strength in her left leg to do unsupervised exercises, there were other patients who were more independent and could have benefited from the app for physical therapy while they were in the rehab center.
During At-home Therapy
The stroke survivor felt that she did not get a lot of time with the therapist due to a large amount of her time consumed in the documentation, re-assessment and answering questions like what exercises she has done since her last visit. Her caregiver was needed to take notes for her homework. She felt that all this manual work could have been eliminated if the therapist had given her access to self-assessment the way 9zest does.
During Outpatient Therapy
Going to outpatient therapy center 4 times a week was very burdensome for the stroke survivor and her caregiver. At times, it consumed 4 hours of time in getting ready, going to the center and coming back. If combined, it took about 32 hours per week of her time and her caregiver’s time. She felt that using the app could have significantly reduced her number of outpatient visits.
She also feels that the handouts given to a stroke survivor for the home workout were not very effective. Compared to that, the 9zest app could have been much easier to follow.
Download 9zest Stroke Rehab App here:
This Blog is contributed by Dr. Deepak Kr. Nain. He is a certified therapist who specializes in the field of rehabilitation. Deepak possesses a clinical expertise in prescribing the best solutions to help people with neurological disorders such as Parkinson’s disease, Stroke, Multiple Sclerosis (MS) and Guillain-Barré Syndrome (GBS).