Effects of a standard transfer exercise program on transfer quality and activities of daily living for transfer-dependent spinal cord injury patients.
Ji-Sung You, You Lim Kim, Suk Min Lee
PMID 28356635WHAT IT FOUND
Adding a six-week transfer exercise and image training program to general physical therapy improved transfer quality and some daily independence in spinal cord injury patients who needed help transferring.
Usual therapy alone did not show these gains.
Key findings
01After six weeks, the experimental group's transfer quality scores rose from 5.33 to 7.34, while the control group's scores rose from 5.54 to 5.89.
02The experimental group's daily living total score rose from 29.58 to 31.33, while the control group's total score rose from 23.50 to 23.70.
03The control group did not show significant improvement after training on the transfer or daily living scores.
STILL TO COME
How it was doneWhat they foundWhat it means for PTs
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What it does not show
The study was small: 12 patients in the experimental group and 10 in the control group. The groups were assigned by pseudo-random allocation, not by a clearly described randomisation method. Patients were recruited from one hospital, so the result may not apply to other settings. The experimental group received general physical therapy plus a multi-component transfer program, so the contribution of each part cannot be separated. The amount of assistant help in the daily living measure ranged widely from 1% to 100%. The paper does not name a primary outcome, and it reports several transfer and daily living scores.
The easy way to misread this
Do not read the gains as proof that the transfer exercise program alone caused them. Both groups received general physical therapy, and the experimental group received education, image training, seated exercises and graded transfer practice as one program. The paper also did not name a primary outcome, so these results should not be used as strong evidence that any single component works.