Inpatient Rehabilitation
What to Expect: Inpatient Care

What to Expect During Your Inpatient Stay With Rehabilitation Medicine

If your child requires intensive therapy, we offer highly specialized inpatient care.

Located on Cincinnati Children's Burnet Campus, our 12-bed inpatient unit serves children and adolescents, ages 1 to 18.

As part of a top-ranked children's hospital, our environment for recovery and functional improvement is unmatched. We offer two therapy gyms with state-of-the-art, advanced technologies and equipment including virtual motion and robotic-assisted systems to aid in accelerating recovery of motor and cognitive skills.

Our patients also have access to an inpatient school classroom, child life activity centers, community outings and school visits, and more.

As one of three CARF-accredited pediatric programs in the state, we are committed to providing the best possible care to your child and keeping you closely involved in the entire process. 

Preparing for Your Stay

While preparing for your stay, there are a few items you may want to bring:

  • Comfortable, loose-fitting clothes
  • Sweater, sweatshirt or jacket
  • Personal care items (brush, toothbrush, deodorant, etc.)
  • Items to personalize the room and bring comfort (pillow, blanket, favorite toy, etc.)

Our care team can also provide a more detailed packing list for your child's stay.

During Your Stay

Care Team

During your inpatient stay, your child's care team will include:

  • Rehabilitation Medicine Physicians (Physiatrists)
  • Nurses
  • Occupational Therapists
  • Physical Therapists
  • Speech Language Therapists
  • Therapeutic Recreation Therapists
  • Social Workers
  • Care Management Specialists

Depending on your child's needs, the care team may also include:

  • Behavioral Medicine Specialists
  • Child Life Specialists
  • Dieticians
  • Music Therapists
  • Neuropsychologists
  • School Intervention Specialists
  • School Teacher

Treatment Plan

While your child stays in our inpatient rehabilitation unit, their personalized care plan may include:

  • Occupational therapy to help people regain or learn skills of everyday life, such as dressing, bathing and writing by hand
  • Physical therapy to help people reduce pain, increase flexibility, range of motion, and function, build strength and correct posture
  • Speech language therapy to assist with swallowing difficulties, communication impairments and memory issues
  • Recreational therapy to help patients improve their physical health and well-being

School Liaison Services

School liaisons collaborate with families, medical providers, and school teams to provide support for school-aged children receiving inpatient rehabilitation care.

Collaboration with the patient’s family, school, and medical team could include:

  • Acting as the link among patient and family, the school and the medical team, making the transition back to school easier.
  • Providing medical documentation as well as the medical team’s recommendations to assist with planning for the patient’s return to school.
  • Providing staff and peers with information about a patient’s diagnosis, medical care and implications on education. We will attend meetings virtually or make in-person visits to schools within 60 miles of Cincinnati Children's.
  • Communicating neuropsychological evaluation results.

For more information about these services and more, visit the Center for School Services.

Family-Centered Care

Caregivers play a very important role throughout their child's stay. We hold family-centered rounds each morning and encourage you to attend. This is a good opportunity to talk about how therapy is progressing and determine if any changes are needed for the treatment plan. You can also share your impressions, ideas and concerns during this time.

Going Home

Being discharged involves communication, collaboration and education for a smooth transition home. Before your child leaves inpatient care, we’ll teach you how to properly care for them at home, including how to care for any equipment they need.

We also offer ongoing support, such as home care, school intervention and outpatient rehabilitation services. Our goal is to help you and your child return home and to the community with new skills and greater confidence about the future.

Frequently Asked Questions

Your child will have access to two state-of-the-art gyms with advanced technology that helps accelerate recovery of motor and cognitive skills. Our technology and equipment includes:

Functional Electrical Stimulation (FES)

A well-established rehabilitation technique which uses pulses of electrical current to stimulate peripheral nerves evoking muscle contractions and patterned muscle activity. FES creates patterned movement in the arms, legs and trunk, and enables muscles to work and perform activities even though they may be weak or paralyzed through neurological disease or injury.

Sanet Vision Integrator (SVI)

Used to improve visual abilities for a wide range of patients with visually related learning problems, amblyopia and traumatic brain injury. It is effective when working with acquired brain injury patients who experience visual field loss, visual-spatial neglect and writing problems, as well as patients with rhythm, reading, and math problems. Lastly, it is indicated for use to enhance body awareness, balance, and stability during dynamic UE movements. The SVI instrument actually “speaks,” instructing the patient to respond to verbal commands, improving auditory-visual integration and memory.

TYROSTATION

A combination of the Pablo and Tymo. The Pablo can be used as a therapy tool for both the upper and lower extremities. The Pablo System and Tymo are very versatile and can be used in both occupational and physical therapy. The Pablo (similar to the shape of a joystick) is held in the hand while playing a video game to address upper extremity strengthening, range of motion, and/or coordination. It can also be strapped to the trunk or lower extremity to work on ROM, strengthening or coordination. Additionally, the multiboard and multiball allow the patient to work on UE strength, ROM and/or coordination while using the table for support. Tymo can be used for training and improving equilibrium, balance and postural control as well as active employment of force and supporting activities of the upper extremities.

ZeroG

A gait and balance training system by Aretech is a robotic overground body-weight support system. Patients wear a harness that connects to the ZeroG as it tracks their movements from above. ZeroG prevents falls and uses dynamic body-weight support to partially unweight the patient as they practice walking, balance exercises, sit-to-stand, getting off the floor, stairs, and many other activities in the rehabilitation process. With the interactive balance programs and games, using the ZeroG is fun, yet challenges the patients both physically and cognitively.