The Bed Rest Avoidance Study

Hospitalized patients spend the majority of their time lying in bed, even when they are capable of being out of bed. Up to 50% of inpatients suffer functional decline at least in part due to lying in bed after admission, and even those who are not placed on bed rest by their physicians spend an average of 20 out of 24 hours lying in bed. The loss of functional ability and exercise tolerance happens remarkably fast, as early as hospital day 2 (24-48 hours). Functional decline often results in a prolonged hospital stay and the need for additional rehabilitation resources both during and after the hospitalization to return a patient to their baseline functional status. Functional decline has also been associated with excess mortality. The investigators sought to flip the culture of hospital-based care such that the bed was viewed as a place for patients to sleep, and patients would be encouraged to get out of bed when they were not trying to sleep. The investigators hypothesized that patients were unaware of the risks of prolonged immobilization and that the lack of an alternative comfortable place for patients to sit other than their bed contributed to their immobility. Previous studies have demonstrated that mobility protocols improve patient-centered outcomes in narrow patient populations such as post-surgical patients or the elderly, but such interventions have not been studied in a heterogeneous patient population. Additionally, previously studied protocols have been labor-intensive from a nursing standpoint, requiring, for example, that staff provide one-on-one supervised ambulation 3-4 times per day. The investigators aimed to determine whether establishing a relatively low-intensity, pragmatic protocol to discourage patients from lying in bed would result in shorter length of stay by improving mobility. The investigators further aimed to assess the additional impact of providing a recliner chair, a safe and comfortable alternative to their bed on these outcome