When patients were matched for age, gender, operative diagnosis, severity index, and admission ambulation FIM score, those who received rehabilitation in the IRF had shorter length of stay and superior functional outcomes than those in the SNF setting. Cost of stay in an IRF was, however, significantly greater.

When patients were matched for age, gender, operative diagnosis, and admission ambulation FIM, those who received rehabilitation in the IRF had, on average, a shorter length of stay and superior functional outcomes than those treated in SNFs.

The coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic has necessitated drastic changes across the spectrum of health care, all of which have occurred with unprecedented rapidity. The need to accommodate change on such a large scale has required ingenuity and decisive thinking. The field of physical medicine and rehabilitation has been faced with many of these challenges. Healthcare practitioners in New York City, the epicenter of the pandemic in the United States, were among the first to encounter many of these challenges. One of the largest lessons included learning how to streamline admissions and transfer process into an acute rehabilitation hospital as part of a concerted effort to make acute care hospital beds available as quickly as possible. Disclosure

No abstract