Investigating the Perspectives of Preceptors in Sports and Exercise Medicine Clinical Practice in Ghana: A Qualitative Study.

The Japanese government announced plans to implement a community-based integrated care system by 2025 []. As outlined in this plan, convalescent rehabilitation wards play a crucial role in facilitating seamless integration between the acute and community-based phases. Standard medical follow-up care in the community phase typically involves two options: regular hospital or clinic visits, and home-visit medical care by physicians. Upon discharge from the convalescent rehabilitation ward, patients are required to choose the modality of their subsequent medical follow-up care []. Among these patients, those who have suffered severe strokes often find it difficult to move outdoors, making regular hospital visits burdensome. Consequently, medical management through home-visit medical care is often chosen, and home-based care such as home-visit rehabilitation may also be introduced []. The role of home-visit medical care in Japan includes not only medical management―such as examinations, diagnoses, and drug therapy conducted by doctors from hospitals or clinics visiting patients' homes once or twice a month, as well as emergency house calls during sudden illnesses―but also discharge support [, ]. Furthermore, home care involves multidisciplinary interventions by nurses, rehabilitation staff, care managers, and others []. In particular, home-visit rehabilitation is provided to patients who have difficulty accessing rehabilitation facilities such as hospitals, aiming to support their independence in daily life and social participation []. Previous reports on the efficacy of home-visit medical care in Japan indicate that the provision of assistance from healthcare organizations capable of offering home medical services on a 24-h basis may contribute to a reduction in the rate of readmission within 30 days of discharge []. Furthermore, international studies have reported that receiving home care during the transition from hospital―a phase often fraught with difficulties for patients with stroke―improves quality of life, self-efficacy, physical function, and activities of daily living (ADL), while reducing readmission rates []. Despite these advantages, the rate and characteristics of patients with cerebrovascular disease who are followed up with home-visit medical care after discharge from a convalescent rehabilitation ward remain unknown.