[Huganurse]

What are the major differences between working in a sub acute vs a rehab hospital.
I'd love any input you may have to give.

[HappyNurseMom]

I currently work in a hospital based Inpatient Rehab unit. We also have a Sub-Acute Unit in house. The biggest differences are staffing. They generally one schedule one RN per shift, maybe 2 LPN depending on census and several CNAs. The care is different on rehab. I always remind myself the REASON the pt on our unit is not focused on the Rehab, they have to have medical reasons also, hence the need for inpt rehab. Rehab in a wonderful places to be as a nurse.

[Hape2baRN]

The difference in Sub Acute Rehab and Acute Rehab is the tolerance of therapy hours. Inpatient acute Rehab a patient has to be able to tolerate at least 3 hours of therapy a day. In a Sub acute Rehab setting the therapy pace is slower.

[CashewLPN]

well... it has been my experience that the hospital rehab is the more critical(and we all know we get hit with some doozies) then the sub acute rehab...
hospital rehab seems to be staffed slightly better(on eves, we max out at 10, days at 8, nights at 12) wheras in the long term rehab, it'd be 1 'charge nurse' (paper pusher) and 1 'medication/treatment/fix any darn thing that happens nurse' for the 30 patients...

I enjoy the hospital rehab better than the sub acute....
just a personal preference I suppose....

--Barbara

[Skywatcher]

I was always told Acute Rehab had to be able to tolerate 3 hours of therapy per day. Patients could be admitted if medically stable and able to build up to 3 hours of therapy within 3 days or could be placed on medical hold for up to 3 days if becomes unstable medically and still unstable after 3 days had to be transferred to med/surg floor. Any comments, please. Thanks