Rehabilitation Professionals Still Do Not Communicate Effectively About Cognition

Abstract Objective To examine current use of descriptive labels for levels of cognitive impairment and types of memory to explore whether rehabilitation disciplines are now communicating more effectively. Design Survey of rehabilitation professionals. Setting Hospital rehabilitation programs. Participants Respondents (N=130) representing 8 facilities in 5 states completed surveys. Interventions Not applicable. Main Outcome Measures Responses to survey questions about severity and types of memory impairment were examined with the Kruskal-Wallis test to determine the impact of profession on ratings. Post hoc Mann-Whitney U test comparisons of the 2 professions with the most cognitive assessment experience, psychologists/neuropsychologists and speech-language pathologists, were conducted. Results Ratings of various deficit levels differed significantly by profession (mild: H =39.780, P