Symposium

Improving Intervention Research Design and Reporting Using the Rehabilitation Treatment Specification System 9573

Corresponding Presenter(s)

• 

  Jeanne M. Zanca, MPT, PhD, FACRM

  Assistant Director, Center for Spinal Cord Injury Research
  Kessler Foundation
  West Orange, New Jersey, United States

  Slides

Presenter(s)

• 

  Sue Ann Sisto, PT, MA, PhD, FACRM

  Professor and Chair
  University at Buffalo
  Buffalo, NY, United States
• 

  Jeremy Wolfberg, MS, CCC-SLP (he/him/his)

  Research Speech-Language Pathologist / Doctoral Fellow
  Massachusetts General Hospital
  Boston, Massachusetts, United States
• 

  Jarrad H. Van Stan, PhD, CCC-SLP

  Associate Professor
  Harvard Medical School
  Boston, Massachusetts, United States

Non-Presenting Contributor(s)

• 

  Marcel P. Dijkers, PhD (he/him/his)

  Adjunct Professor of Physical Medicine and Rehabilitation
  Wayne State University
  Berkley, MI, United States

Presenter(s)

• 

  John Whyte, MD, PhD (he/him/his)

  Institute Scientist Emeritus
  Moss Rehabilitation Research Institute
  Philadelphia, PA, United States

The Rehabilitation Treatment Specification System (RTSS) is a conceptual system that facilitates decision-making and communication about the “ingredients” of treatment being studied in rehabilitation research and the functional changes they are thought to produce. This presentation will discuss key concepts of the RTSS and how this system can inform design or selection of experimental and comparator interventions, assist in the identification of appropriate measures of treatment delivery and outcomes, improve research reporting, and facilitate use of research by clinicians. The presentation will be of interest to researchers at all stages of their research careers as well as clinicians involved in the process of applying intervention research to clinical practice.

Learning Objectives:

• Describe basic concepts of the Rehabilitation Treatment Specification System (such as treatment theory, target, mechanism of action, ingredients, volition, and aims).
• Discuss how RTSS concepts can support development or selection of experimental and comparator interventions to study for a given clinical problem.
• Describe how treatment theory and enablement theory can guide selection of measures.
• Describe how the RTSS can aid research reporting to make reports more and more immediately useful to clinicians.
• Discuss how RTSS concepts can assist clinicians in evaluating and applying rehabilitation research findings.
• Describe basic concepts of the Rehabilitation Treatment Specification System (such as treatment theory, target, mechanism of action, ingredients, volition, and aims).