ORIGINAL PAPER THE RESPONSE OF BRAIN-DAMAGED PATIENTS TO A REHABILITATION REGIME

No relationship was found between non-verbal learning capacity (taken as a measure of brain damage) and progress towards functional independence as measured by ad hoc scales of mobility, self-care, and general performance in a rehabilitation centre. This leaves open the possibility that cognitive and motivational factors of the kind investigated have a bearing on the patient's ultimate social adjustment. IT IS generally agreed that the outcome of medical rehabilitation is dependent on a variety of factors, not all of them medical in nature. Experience at the Wolfson Medical Rehabilitation Centre (which opened in 1967) has shown that on neurological examina-tion there may be little difference between the patient who can fend for himself and return to work, and the patient who remains unemployed and entirely dependent on those around him. Crucial factors may reside in the patient himself and/or in his environment, but they are often hard to identify at the outset. In our present state of knowledge the selection of patients for rehabilitation is based largely on clinical judg-ment, which may not take cognizance of all the relevant information. The Wolfson Centre has 48 beds and places for up to 50 day-patients, with a