The effect of evidence-based discharge planning on the health outcomes of stroke patients with dysphagia: a prospective cohort study

Aims: To evaluate the effects of an evidence-based discharge planning on the health outcomes of stroke patients with dysphagia. Design: Prospective cohort study. Methods: This study was conducted with stroke patients who were diagnosed with dysphagia and scheduled to be discharged to their homes. A total of 90 eligible patients were consecutively enrolled to the exposed group and non-exposed group. The exposed group received an evidence-based discharge planning with follow-up at 7 and 30 days after discharge. The non-exposed group received routine care with the same length of care and follow-up as the exposed group. Trained research assistant collected all patients' baseline data on admission (T0), recorded unplanned re-admission and aspiration, evaluated the discharge readiness, self-management ability and safe feeding on the day of discharge (T1), 7 days post-discharge (T2), and 30 days post-discharge (T3). Results: Compared with the non-exposed group, the exposed group showed significantly lower rate of unplanned readmission, lower incidence of aspiration, improvement in discharge readiness, self-management ability, and safe feeding scores. Conclusion: An evidence-based discharge planning can significantly reduce unplanned readmission rate and aspiration in stroke patients with dysphagia, and significantly improving patients' discharge readiness, self-management ability and safe feeding. It provides clinical care with a clear and effective guideline plan for the management of patients with dysphagia in stroke. Clinical trial registration: The study has been registered with the Chinese Clinical Trial Registry (http://www.chictr.org.cn) under registration number ChiCTR24000087983.