Can patients reproduce partial weight bearing orders?

All participants will receive standard medical, nursing and allied health care during and after their hospital admission. This care, including instruction in partial weight bearing during mobilisation by physiotherapists, will not change as a result of participation in the current study. Our physiotherapists currently use the hand-under-foot or bathroom scale method to instruct patients in partial weight bearing, with the method chosen at the discretion of the treating physiotherapist. Instruction is repeated until the patient and physiotherapist are confident that the patient can reproduce the partial weight bearing orders. Further instruction on subsequent episodes of mobilisation is undertaken as deemed necessary. Additionally, when mobilising patients, physiotherapy staff observe the patient’s style of mobilisation and estimate whether partial weight bearing to the prescribed level is occurring. Repeated instruction is provided for patients when over-loading is suspected. Instruction in partial weight bearing status will occur only during the period of hospitalisation.