Abstract
Inpatient rehabilitation with medical, psychological, physical and occupational therapy is an expensive approach to rheumatoid arthritis and information about its influence on patients' health status is so far unavailable. Therefore, changes in patients' health status after inpatient rehabilitation were examined in 48 patients with definite or classical rheumatoid arthritis using a multidimensional questionnaire which had been derived from the Arthritis Impact Measurement Scales from Boston University. At discharge, health status was improved in almost all of its physical and all psychological dimensions, whereas in a preliminary study of 20 outpatients we did not find any significant improvement during a four-week period. The improvements achieved decreased during the following year showing the most stable results for decreased pain, anxiety and depression. One year after discharge overall health status was still higher than at admission in 21 of the patients. In a subgroup of patients with shorter duration of the disease improvements were more pronounced. This finding suggests that inpatient rehabilitation is especially useful in the beginning of the disease.
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