Why Neurorehabilitation is Important
Slow stream neurorehabilitation has now been firmly integrated into the brain injury treatment pathway across many NHS Trusts and PCTs due to a number of factors including acknowledgement of clinical benefits, acceptance of the long term cost savings it can provide, national and local policies of moving longer term care from the hospital setting and the ability of slow stream rehabilitation to unblock hospital beds.
Slower stream rehabilitation is a transition between the acute hospital setting and the community environment (either at home or in residential care). Integration of this provision into the brain injury pathway has become more prevalent over the last decade and is now firmly established within a large number of NHS Trusts. Key drivers behind this include:
1. There is now strong evidence to demonstrate the benefits of rehabilitation after the first 6-12 months after injury
"Where an acute episode has occured, as with head injury, the greatest progress is often achieved over the following two years, in such cases a speedy referral to rehabilitation services is important" (Neurological Alliance 2006)
2. Increasingly there is an acknowledgement that slower stream brain injury rehabilitation can provide long term cost savings due to reduced levels of care required for the duration of the patients life
"The NSF recognises that early and intensive rehabilitation is cost effective and that adequately staffed and resourced specialist rehabilitation services are required to deliver this (BSRM 2009)
3. Current Department of Health policy is to move more care away from the hospital setting. Slower stream neurorehabilitation in a non-acute, in patient setting is a solution to this need
"Longer term residential rehabilitation should be within community settings, rather than hospital sites, and should be in facilities specialising in ABI" (BPS 2005)
