Impact of a Therapeutic Dance Program Compared With Circuit Physiotherapy in Rehabilitation of Older People With Recent Acquired Brain Injury: A Randomized Controlled Feasibility Trial With Embedded Qualitative Assessment.

The trial was small (43 people analysed) and ran in a single hospital, and it was set up as a feasibility study, so it only had the power to detect large differences between the two programs. Despite randomisation, many more men ended up in the circuit group (71% versus 44%), and the authors say this may have affected the results. The improvements in mood and fatigue seen at the end of the program were not sustained at the 4-week follow-up. People with significant aphasia or with mobility limitations were excluded, so the findings do not apply to them. The circuit group rated their exercise as physically harder on the Borg scale, which the authors say may reflect a genuine difference in how demanding the two programs were. Only 23.79% of eligible patients agreed to be randomised, which the trial's own progression criteria flag as a borderline result. Both groups carried on with their usual medical, nursing and allied health care during the trial, so this compares dance with circuit physiotherapy rather than with no treatment. People who needed more physical support in the group reported feeling that they were more impaired than others, and those with less impairment felt they got less therapist attention; the authors suggest future trials stratify by functional level instead of age and time since injury.

The disclosures name three authors with funding ties. S.H., a research physiotherapist on the team, and W.S., who holds a position on the research team, were funded or partly funded by the research grant (referred to as the LSA grant). M.C. holds an unpaid director position and is supported by several grants but receives no salary from them, with consulting funds paid directly to the university. The remaining authors declared nothing. The professional dancers who ran the sessions were paid from the grant funding. The paper does not say who designed the study or wrote the manuscript, and no commercial company is named as a sponsor.

Do not read this as proof that dance works better than conventional rehabilitation. Physical outcomes such as walking and balance were the same in both groups, the mood and fatigue advantages had disappeared by the 4-week follow-up, and the study was a feasibility trial of 43 people in one hospital, designed to test whether a larger trial is possible rather than whether dance works.