Transition to Multidisciplinary Pediatric Telerehabilitation during the COVID-19 Pandemic: Strategy Development and Implementation

Tal Krasovsky, Tamar Silberg, Sharon Barak, Etzyona Eisenstein, Neta Erez, Irit Feldman, Dafna Guttman, Pnina Liber, Smadar Zohar Patael, Hadar Sarna, Yaara Sadeh, Pnina Steinberg and Jana Landa
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Tal Krasovsky: Department of Physical Therapy, University of Haifa, Haifa 3498838, Israel
Tamar Silberg: Department of Pediatric Rehabilitation, the Edmond and Lily Safra Children’s Hospital, Sheba Medical Center, Ramat-Gan 5262000, Israel
Sharon Barak: Department of Pediatric Rehabilitation, the Edmond and Lily Safra Children’s Hospital, Sheba Medical Center, Ramat-Gan 5262000, Israel
Etzyona Eisenstein: Department of Pediatric Rehabilitation, the Edmond and Lily Safra Children’s Hospital, Sheba Medical Center, Ramat-Gan 5262000, Israel
Neta Erez: Department of Pediatric Rehabilitation, the Edmond and Lily Safra Children’s Hospital, Sheba Medical Center, Ramat-Gan 5262000, Israel
Irit Feldman: Department of Pediatric Rehabilitation, the Edmond and Lily Safra Children’s Hospital, Sheba Medical Center, Ramat-Gan 5262000, Israel
Dafna Guttman: Department of Pediatric Rehabilitation, the Edmond and Lily Safra Children’s Hospital, Sheba Medical Center, Ramat-Gan 5262000, Israel
Pnina Liber: Department of Pediatric Rehabilitation, the Edmond and Lily Safra Children’s Hospital, Sheba Medical Center, Ramat-Gan 5262000, Israel
Smadar Zohar Patael: Department of Pediatric Rehabilitation, the Edmond and Lily Safra Children’s Hospital, Sheba Medical Center, Ramat-Gan 5262000, Israel
Hadar Sarna: Department of Pediatric Rehabilitation, the Edmond and Lily Safra Children’s Hospital, Sheba Medical Center, Ramat-Gan 5262000, Israel
Yaara Sadeh: Department of Pediatric Rehabilitation, the Edmond and Lily Safra Children’s Hospital, Sheba Medical Center, Ramat-Gan 5262000, Israel
Pnina Steinberg: Department of Pediatric Rehabilitation, the Edmond and Lily Safra Children’s Hospital, Sheba Medical Center, Ramat-Gan 5262000, Israel
Jana Landa: Department of Pediatric Rehabilitation, the Edmond and Lily Safra Children’s Hospital, Sheba Medical Center, Ramat-Gan 5262000, Israel

IJERPH, 2021, vol. 18, issue 4, 1-13

Abstract: Telerehabilitation offers a unique solution for continuity of care in pediatric rehabilitation under physical distancing. The major aims of this study were to: (1) describe the development of telerehabilitation usage guidelines in a large hospital in Israel, and to (2) evaluate the implementation of telerehabilitation from the perspectives of healthcare practitioners and families. An expert focus group developed guidelines which were disseminated to multidisciplinary clinicians. Following sessions, clinicians filled The Clinician Evaluation of Telerehabilitation Service (CETS), a custom-built feedback questionnaire on telerehabilitation, and parents completed the client version of the Therapist Presence Inventory (TPI-C) and were asked to rate the effectiveness of sessions on an ordinal scale. Four goals of telerehabilitation sessions were defined: (1) maintenance of therapeutic alliance, (2) provision of parental coping strategies, (3) assistance in maintaining routine, and (4) preventing functional deterioration. Principal Components Analysis was used for the CETS questionnaire and the relationships of CETS and TPI-C with child’s age and the type of session were evaluated using Spearman’s correlations and the Kruskal–Wallis H test. In total, sixty-seven telerehabilitation sessions, with clients aged 11.31 ± 4.8 years, were documented by clinicians. Three components (child, session, parent) explained 71.3% of the variance in CETS. According to therapists, their ability to maintain the therapeutic alliance was generally higher than their ability to achieve other predefined goals ( p < 0.01). With younger children, the ability to provide feedback to the child, grade treatment difficulty and provide coping strategies to the parents were diminished. Families perceived the therapist as being highly present in therapy regardless of treatment type. These results demonstrate a potential framework for the dissemination of telerehabilitation services in pediatric rehabilitation.

Keywords: telehealth; children; physical therapy; occupational therapy; COVID-19; coronavirus; presence (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: I I1 I3 Q Q5 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2021
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (3)

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