The dose and intensity of exercise each participant completes in a set time can vary significantly. In addition, measurement of total time spent in therapy may not take into account rests and other interruptions to therapy sessions. In

fact, an observational study of activity levels in rehabilitation found that rehabilitation participants complete relevant activities only 45% of the time they are in a therapy area (Mackey et al 1996). This suggests that studies using time as a measure of exercise dosage may be overestimating actual exercise substantially. A count of each repetition of exercise the participant completes may be a more accurate measure of exercise dosage. This would capture the selleck screening library work the participant completes and not any accessory activities nor resting time. Several published studies have used repetitions to measure dosage (Lang et al 2009, Lang et al 2007, Nugent et al 1994). These studies have used either a therapist or an external observer

to record repetitions of exercise. External observation is a labour-intensive process that would be impractical for studies with large cohorts or for daily clinical practice. An alternative strategy is for rehabilitation participants to count their own exercise repetitions while completing their prescribed exercise. This method has been implemented in several rehabilitation units including selleckchem Bankstown-Lidcombe Hospital in Sydney, Australia. It is usual clinical practice at Bankstown-Lidcombe Hospital for rehabilitation patients to count their own exercise repetitions with a hand-held tally counter if they are able to do this. These exercise totals are recorded and used for clinical decision-making and documentation.

The aim of this study was to determine if rehabilitation participants assessed by their therapist as being able to count their repetitions of exercise accurately (based on a short period of observation) are able to count exercise repetitions accurately when observed more closely over a longer period of time. The validity of exercise dose quantification by therapist-selected rehabilitation participants was determined by PD184352 (CI-1040) comparing the number of exercise repetitions counted by participants to the number counted by an external observer. Therefore, the research question for this study was: Can therapist-identified rehabilitation participants accurately quantify their exercise dosage during inpatient rehabilitation? An observational study was conducted involving people admitted to inpatient rehabilitation at Bankstown-Lidcombe Hospital, Sydney during the six-week study period beginning in November 2009. Participants were included from two rehabilitation units: aged care rehabilitation and stroke/neurological rehabilitation. We sought to observe 20 participants from each unit who were deemed likely to be able to count exercise repetitions accurately while they exercised.