Effect of blood pressure on recovery outcomes in inpatients with atherothrombotic infarction: A retrospective cross-sectional study

Stroke is one of the leading causes of death worldwide, and the relationship between blood pressure (BP) and outcomes after atherothrombotic infarction has been studied from various perspectives. However, the relationship of BP with rehabilitation outcomes and activities of daily living after atherothrombotic infarction has not been studied extensively. This study aims to investigate the effect of BP on rehabilitation outcomes and activities of daily living after atherothrombotic infarction. In this retrospective cross-sectional study, we analyzed data obtained from the Japan Association of Rehabilitation Database for inpatients undergoing rehabilitation using Wilcoxon's test, Pearson's chi-squared test, or Fisher's exact test. The patients were initially categorized into hypertensive and non-hypertensive groups and were assessed using the 10-item Barthel index (BI) activities and total BI at hospital discharge. The patients were further dichotomized into dependent (patients with scores of 0 for each activity) and nondependent groups based on the BI activities. Compared with hypertensive conditions (n = 108), non-hypertensive conditions (n = 213) were associated with higher dependence (feeding, transfers, toilet use, dressing, and bowel and bladder control). The proportion of non-hypertensive patients with a severely low BI (0-15) was higher than that of hypertensive patients. The hypertensive group had a greater increase in the BI (25 vs 15, P = .006) and daily BI (1.2 vs 0.74, P = .014) than the non-hypertensive group. During in-hospital rehabilitation, hypertensive patients recovered more efficiently than their non-hypertensive counterparts, emphasizing the need for personalized rehabilitation plans based on their individual BP profiles. Our results underscore the impact of BP on inpatients after atherothrombotic infarction, indicating that more non-hypertensive inpatients are affected by BP while receiving treatment than are hypertensive inpatients during rehabilitation.