Researchers at UTMB have found that rehabilitation outcomes for people who have had a stroke vary greatly depending on where they live in the United States. The study, recently published in the journal Archives of Physical Medicine and Rehabilitation, examined Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services records from 143,036 patients discharged from inpatient rehabilitation during 2006 and 2007. Researchers focused on length of stay, functional status (discharge motor and cognitive status, overall functional change) and the percentage of patients discharged to the community. The study found a 20 percent difference in community discharge rates across regions. The region with the highest percentage of community discharge was the Southwest (79.1 percent), while the lowest region was the Northeast (59.4 percent). “Understanding how geographic variability is associated with outcomes will help rehabilitation professionals and administrators implement practice guidelines and quality improvement programs designed to improve care in areas with poor outcomes,” said lead author Timothy Reistetter, an associate professor in the Department of Occupational Therapy at UTMB. “An important step in this process is to describe region-specific outcomes of rehabilitative care at the national level.” Guidry News Service features a spotlight with Reistetter as well.