Promotion of Physical Activity Through Reablement for Older Adults: Exploring Healthcare Professionals’ Clinical Reasoning

INTRODUCTION: Reablement is an interdisciplinary, multifactorial, and individualized intervention aimed at improving function and maintaining the independence of community-dwelling older adults who receive home care services. Physical activity (PA) is important for functional ability in older adults, but it is unclear how PA is promoted through reablement. Healthcare professionals’ (HCPs) clinical reasoning and decision-making are essential and determine how reablement is delivered to individuals. Exploring how HCPs integrate PA into their clinical reasoning is critical to understanding how PA is integrated within reablement. To gain knowledge of how PA is integrated within reablement, there is a need to explore how HCPs integrate PA into their clinical reasoning. PURPOSE: The study aimed to explore how PA is integrated into HCPs’ clinical reasoning in a Norwegian reablement setting. METHODS: Sixteen HCPs, including occupational and physical therapists, registered nurses, and other home care staff, were recruited from four Norwegian municipalities. They participated in semi-structured interviews that were transcribed verbatim, and an interpretive content analysis approach was used. RESULTS: PA was integrated into multifaceted clinical reasoning captured by the main theme: “Improving the person’s ability to participate in meaningful activities.” Within this overall theme, two sub-themes emerged with a primary focus on either i) increasing physical capacity or ii) improving activity performance. Each subtheme encompassed different aspects of clinical reasoning and diverse perspectives on how to integrate PA in reablement. CONCLUSION: HCPs’ decision-making in reablement builds upon complex clinical reasoning and incorporates diverse perspectives on integrating PA in the delivery of reablement. This broad approach may be useful in targeting different needs, preferences, and contexts. There is a need to further investigate how PA is appropriately promoted through reablement, how it meets the needs and preferences of participants, and which contextual factors influence PA promotion through reablement.