Listening Time — 25:40
"A tremendous dataset — very powerful … and to be able to both develop and validate a prediction model was very impressive." That's how PTJ Editor-in-Chief Alan Jette, PT, PhD, FAPTA, characterizes the latest research of Gerard Brennan, PT, PhD, FAPTA, on predicting clinical improvement in low back pain using the Modified Low Back Pain Disability Questionnaire. The study looked at 63,000 patients with low back pain and 15,000 patients in the validation dataset. What led Brennan to pursue this line of investigation?
"To be totally honest, I think it was a hunch that people who had … a less than 50% chance of achieving a minimal clinically important difference — we weren't recognizing that right at the outset [of care] … . If physical therapists understood more specifically the chance of a patient not succeeding clinically in physical therapy, maybe they would pause and consider the possibilities of implementing different clinical pathways and making different clinical decisions." Brennan wanted to be able to offer patients a better, more specific estimate of the probability of success, especially considering "what it takes the patient to get to the physical therapy visit," including what it costs in terms of out-of-pocket payments. Don't miss these insights for clinical practice.
Our guests
Gerard P. Brennan, PT, PhD, FAPTA, is senior research scientist for rehabilitation services at Intermountain Healthcare in Murray, Utah.
Alan M. Jette, PT, PhD, FAPTA, is editor-in-chief of PTJ: Physical Therapy & Rehabilitation Journal..