On-site

ARBI provides specialized, community rehabilitation five days a week for individuals with severe brain injury including stroke.

The On-site program includes both individual and group activities that range from intensive rehabilitation to social and emotional support. Therapists incorporate each individual’s goals into their program through a variety of functional exercises. Depending on the severity of the injury, initial goals may vary from learning how to swallow or speak, to long term goals that may include planning a day trip, volunteering in the community or moving back home with loved ones. The following programs are incorporated:

Physical Therapy Program

Focuses on stretching tight muscles, relearning normal movement and improving posture. Programs may progress to balance, coordination and strengthening activities, leading to increased independence in daily activities such as propelling a wheelchair, or walking.  

Occupational Therapy Program

Improves fine motor skills and eye-hand coordination, perceptual and thinking abilities — all skills required for daily living. Promotes regained independence through self-care activities such as: grooming, dressing, eating and basic household skills like cooking and budgeting.

Speech-Language Therapy Program

 Strengthens verbal and non-verbal communication abilities as well as thinking abilities such as memory and problem-solving. Exercises focus on speaking clearly, understanding spoken words, improving memory, reasoning and comprehension.

Recreation Therapy Program

Survivors receive support to re-engage in the community through exploring volunteer and leisure pursuits of personal interest. Activities are thoughtfully chosen to work on overall rehabilitation goals, while maintaining a balanced leisure lifestyle. The program promotes improving clients’ overall sense of well being and self-esteem. 

Music Therapy

The Music Therapist works with the clients through singing, vocalizing, and instrument use. Science says that when the brain listens to music, many areas are stimulated at the same time. For a brain injury survivor, music is an essential part of the rehabilitation process, because it helps re-build neurological-pathways that may not otherwise be stimulated in the same way.

Included in the programs above are many group activities:

Seek and Say

Seek and Say is a part of the Speech-Language Therapy program. It is a group that helps clients improve their word finding skills in a fun and social environment. Once a week participants meet to work on improving communication skills and pulling descriptive words from their brain’s memory bank. Games and activities are used to facilitate the group. 

Happy Fitness Gang

The Happy Fitness Gang is a group exercise class for stroke clients. It is part of Physical Therapy and Occupational Therapy programs, and incorporates Speech-Language Therapy. The group targets clients' mobility and endurance while still sitting in the wheelchair. It covers a list of exercises that have been developed by our physiotherapists and occupational therapists. 

ARBI 101

ARBI 101 is a wheelchair fitness group. It gives prospective clients a chance to connect with ARBI while ARBI staff can decide whether clients’ tolerance and commitment are suitable for ARBI programs.  To bridge the wait period between clients' screening and assessments, and finally program initiation, ARBI 101 wheelchair fitness group offers general armchair fitness, mental stimulation activities, manipulative activities and social interactions. ARBI 101 includes areas of Physical, Occupational and Recreation Therapy.  

Following acceptance into ARBI’s On-site program, the next steps are:

• ARBI’s Physical Therapists, Occupational Therapists, Speech-Language Pathologists and Recreation Therapists conduct comprehensive assessments
• An initial meeting is scheduled to review and agree upon the client’s short term and longer term rehabilitation goals
• Therapists design personalized rehabilitation programs and record each program on DVD to demonstrate proper program implementation with the client. Copies of the written program are also provided 
• ARBI recruits volunteers for clients who do not have funding, to help implement the rehabilitation program
• Clients with funding usually hire a support worker
• The volunteer/support worker undergoes intensive training in proper implementation of the rehabilitation program
• The team of staff provides ongoing supervision and coaching to both the survivor and the volunteer/ support worker
• Assessments occur annually for brain injury survivors and at six months for individuals with stroke. Therapists re-evaluate and update the rehabilitation program as needed according to the client’s progress