Navigating patient-centered goal setting in inpatient stroke rehabilitation: how clinicians control the process to meet perceived professional responsibilities

Objective: Patient-centered goal setting, while central to contemporary rehabilitation, has been associated with growing uncertainty regarding its application in clinical practice. We aimed to examine the application of goal setting in inpatient stroke rehabilitation.

Methods: Data collected from 44 participants (nine patients, seven family members, 28 health professionals), using multiple data sources (interviews, recorded clinical sessions, team meetings, participant-observation, and clinical documentation), were analyzed using constant comparative methods.

Results: Certain goals (characterized by short timeframes, conservative estimation of outcomes, and physical function) were privileged over others. Involvement of patients and family in goal setting resulted in interactional dilemmas when their objectives, skills and perceived capacity did not align with privileged goals. When alignment did occur, greater patient involvement still did not appear to influence clinical reasoning.

Conclusion: This study raises questions about how 'patient-centered' current goal setting practices are and whether a 'patient-centered' approach is even possible in inpatient stroke rehabilitation when considering predominant funding and health system models.

Practice implications: For 'patient-centered' goal setting to be more than rhetorical, clinicians need to examine the values they attribute to certain types of goals, the influence of organizational drivers on goal selection, and how goals are actually used to influence clinical practice.