The Australian and NZ SCI Physiotherapy guideline committee recommends that people with tetraplegia should be assessed by a multidisciplinary team (that includes a physiotherapist) as appropriate to determine suitability for upper limb reconstructive surgery. This is a consensus-based opinion statement supported by the opinions of the experts. There are no randomized controlled trials on this topic. The guideline states:

People with tetraplegia should be assessed by a multidisciplinary team (that includes a physiotherapist) as appropriate to determine suitability for upper limb reconstructive surgery.

This statement was formed by considering the opinions of the experts alongside other factors. The other factors that were considered were benefits and harms, values and preferences, resource use, equity, accessibility, and feasibility.

This is a consensus-based opinion statement. Consensus-based opinion statements are less robust than evidence-based recommendations. They can be strong or weak. This is a strong consensus-based opinion statement which means that the guideline panel is confident they can recommend that people with tetraplegia should be assessed by a multidisciplinary team (that includes a physiotherapist) as appropriate to determine suitability for upper limb reconstructive surgery based on opinion.

To learn more about the this intervention go to the research summary.