A Variation of Observation-to-imitate Plus Practice Intervention to Decrease Latency to Exercise Initiation and Increase Exercise Completion in Neurological Patients.

OBJECTIVES: Some patients referred to physical therapy demonstrate deficits in initiation and completion of physical therapy exercises during appointments. These challenges may create a barrier to benefitting from therapy. We evaluated the effect of observation-to-imitate plus practice (OTI + PP) on decreasing latency to exercise initiation and increasing exercise completion for 2 participants referred for inpatient rehabilitation physical therapy.

METHODS: We used an AB multiple-baseline single-case research design to compare the OTI + PP intervention to each participant's baseline condition for their latency to exercise initiation and completion.

RESULTS: Visual inspection indicates some improvement for 1 of the 2 participants to produce more consistent responding during OTI + PP, but there is an insufficient demonstration of a functional relation due to the small number of participants and lack of effect using visual analysis. The percentage of all nonoverlapping data indicates moderate to large effect sizes of OTI + PP to decrease latency to exercise initiation and increase completion.

CONCLUSIONS: It is possible that OTI + PP could decrease latency to exercise initiation and increase completion, but individual variability, insufficient replication, and the small number of participants could limit conclusions and should be considered.