220 WEEKEND WARRIORS—GETTING OLDER REHABILITATION PATIENTS MORE ACTIVE OVER THE WEEKEND

Abstract

Abstract Background Reduced physical activity levels in hospital can increase an older person’s risk of deconditioning, frailty, sarcopenia (Guy et al., 2012). Older people can spend only 60 minutes upright per day in an in-patient rehabilitation setting (Smith et al., 2008). This can be further reduced at weekends when therapy services are often unavailable. The Weekend Warriors was introduced to older persons’ services in a post-acute rehabilitation hospital to combat this. The aims were: 1. Examine patient perception of physical activity at weekends 2. Examine the feasibility of a weekend activity self-management programme 3. Evaluate patient satisfaction with a self-directed weekend activity programme 4. Evaluate whether a self-directed activity programme lead to increased patient-reported weekend activity levels Methods A pre-intervention anonymous survey was distributed to rehabilitation patients in the older persons’ services examining weekend activity levels and the patients’ perception of same. The Weekend Warriors packs consisted of 4 levels of difficulty and were distributed based on the patient’s ability. A post intervention anonymous survey was distributed. Data was analysed using Microsoft Excel. Results At completion, 19 patients participated in the pre-intervention survey. 10 patients participated in the post-intervention survey. Pre-intervention survey findings show that 74% of patients carried out 30+ minutes of exercise on weekdays, compared to only 21% on weekend days. Post-intervention, this increased to 70% on weekend days. Pre-intervention, 74% of patients felt good about their weekday exercise, while only 36% felt good about exercise on the weekend. Post- intervention, 90% of patients felt good about their weekend exercise. Conclusion Overall, the Weekend Warriors intervention improved time spent exercising at the weekend and patient satisfaction. Further studies could be carried out on the efficacy of creating exercise videos that could be shown to patients on the weekends, or the inclusion of an objective measure.