POST-CONCUSSION PHYSICAL THERAPY REFERALS

BACKGROUND: Treating a concussion is complex, requiring a multi-disciplinary patient-centered approach for optimal outcomes. Physical therapy (PT) is a treatment utilized to facilitate concussion recovery, however little is known about those patients referred to PT. PURPOSE/HYPOTHESIS: The purpose of this study was to report the demographics and other outcome measures of patients referred to PT from an attached specialty concussion clinic. METHODS: Retrospective data were extracted from medical records for patients who were referred for physical therapy (PT) from its specialty concussion clinic. Patients included in this study were aged 8-18, diagnosed with a concussion, and referred to PT. Demographic data (age, gender, ethnicity, race) were patient reported. Other patient outcome measures (total injury recovery in days, total number of PT visits, total days between the first and last PT visit, positive VOMS score (symptom increase of 2 from baseline on any symptom and/or convergence on any trial >6cm). Statistical analyses included summary statistics and were reported appropriately as proportions, medians (interquartile range [IQR]), and means (± standard deviation [SD]). RESULTS: Of the 88 patients referred to PT, the mean (± SD) age was 14.31 (± 2.58), 27.3% were children (8-12 years), 72.7% were adolescents (13-18 years), 65.9% were female, 87.5% were white race, 6.8% were black race, and 12.5% were Hispanic in ethnicity. A total of 84.1% patients had a positive VOMS, 9.1% had a negative VOMS, and 6.8% had an invalid VOMS. On average, patients were seen for 4 (± 2.60) total visits, spanning across an average of 18 (± 14.83) days between initial and last PT visits, with the median recovery between date of injury and medical clearance being 48 days (SD=175). CONCLUSIONS: This is the first study to provide preliminary demographics of post-concussive PT patients referred from its specialty concussion clinic. These results will be useful in establishing future protocols for future studies to examine the effect of early PT intervention on pediatric concussion recovery.