Virginia Law

A. Facilities shall ensure that all restorative care and habilitative service needs of the residents are met. Facilities shall coordinate with appropriate professional service providers and ensure that any facility staff who assist with support for these service needs are trained by and receive direction from qualified professionals. Restorative and habilitative care includes range of motion, assistance with ambulation, positioning, assistance and instruction in the activities of daily living, psychosocial skills training, and reorientation and reality orientation.

B. In the provision of restorative and habilitative care, staff shall emphasize services such as the following:

1. Making every effort to keep residents active, within the limitations set by physicians' or other prescribers' orders;

2. Encouraging residents to achieve independence in the activities of daily living;

3. Assisting residents to adjust to their disabilities, to use their prosthetic devices, and to redirect their interests if they are no longer able to maintain past involvement in particular activities;

4. Assisting residents to carry out prescribed physical therapy exercises between appointments with the physical therapist; and

5. Maintaining a bowel and bladder training program.

C. Facilities shall arrange for specialized rehabilitative services by qualified personnel as needed by the resident. Rehabilitative services include physical therapy, occupational therapy, and speech-language pathology services. Rehabilitative services may be indicated when the resident has lost or has shown a change in his ability to respond to or perform a given task and requires professional rehabilitative services in an effort to regain lost function. Rehabilitative services may also be indicated to evaluate the appropriateness and individual response to the use of assistive technology.

D. All rehabilitative services rendered by a rehabilitative professional shall be performed only upon written medical referral by a physician or other qualified health care professional.

E. The physician's or other prescriber's orders, services provided, evaluations of progress, and other pertinent information regarding the rehabilitative services shall be recorded in the resident's record.

F. Direct care staff who are involved in the care of residents using assistive devices shall know how to operate and utilize the devices.