Expert Consensus for the Use of Outpatient Rehabilitation Visits After Total Knee Arthroplasty: A Delphi Study.
Jeremy Graber, Laura Churchill, Tamara Struessel and 3 others
PMID 37428802WHAT IT FOUND
US experts reached consensus on outpatient knee replacement rehab visit schedules, including starting within one week and not recommending telerehabilitation for slow recovery.
These are expert recommendations, not tested interventions.
Key findings
01The panel reached consensus in Round 1 for visit frequency recommendations in 8 of the 9 combinations of recovery month and recovery status.
02Consensus recommendations included initiating outpatient rehabilitation within 1 week after total knee arthroplasty and recommending telerehabilitation for typical or fast recovery, but not for slow recovery.
03No consensus was reached for visit frequency in postoperative month 3 for patients recovering faster than expected.
STILL TO COME
How it was doneWhat they foundWhat it means for PTs
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What it does not show
No patients were included on the panel, so patient acceptability and usefulness were not tested. The recommendations are expert consensus, not tested interventions, and the study did not show that following them improves outcomes or costs. Practice patterns may differ outside the United States, so the recommendations may not apply elsewhere. The panel did not reach consensus on visit frequency for fast-recovering patients in postoperative month 3. The supplied text does not report the exact visit frequencies that reached consensus.
The easy way to misread this
Do not read these recommendations as evidence that specific visit schedules improve recovery. The study asked experts to agree on visit use, but it did not test patient outcomes.