The Effect of Body Mass Index on Stroke Rehabilitation

Interesting conclusion that overweight patients made better progress. Or is that just the Hawthorne Effect of being under observation?
http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0003999314000896

• David T. Burke, M.D., MA^{1, ,} ,
• Samir Al-Adawi, PhD²,
• Regina B. Bell, BS³,
• Kirk Easley, MS, MApStat⁴,
• Shou Chen, MS⁵,
• Daniel P. Burke⁶

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http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.apmr.2014.01.019

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Abstract

Objective

To investigate the association between body mass index and the functional progress of patients with stroke, admitted to a rehabilitation hospital.

Design

this retrospective cohort study included all patients admitted to the stroke unit of a rehabilitation hospital.

Setting

the setting was a freestanding University rehabilitation Hospital stroke unit.

Participants

Participants (N=819) included all patients admitted to the stroke unit of the rehabilitation Hospital during the study.

Interventions

not applicable

Main Outcome Measures

the primary study outcome measure was the functional Independence measure (FIM) efficiency of patients by body mass index category.

Results

For the 819 patients admitted during the observation period, BMI was compared with FIM score changes per day (FIM efficiency). After adjusting for age, and sex, the FIM efficiency differed by BMI. The underweight group had the lowest FIM efficiency followed by the obese and normal weight subgroups. The overweight group had the highest FIM efficiency (p = 0.05) when compared to the obese subgroup.

Conclusion

This study found that among patients admitted to an acute rehabilitation hospital for stroke rehabilitation, overweight patients had better functional progress than did patients in the other weight categories.