 I was paralyzed and I didn't know how was I going to be able to feed myself, how to close myself, how to even do anything for myself at all. I wanted to be able to go to the bathroom on my own. I wanted to be able to address myself. That was the short term goal. But I also looked at all these people around me doing what they love, the practice of medicine, the practice of nursing. And I realized that was my strength and I just wanted my strength back. This place has taught me never give up. Never give up. Rehab brought me face to face with the intensity of my disability so that I really understood what had happened to me. At the same time it gave me the hope I needed and the skills I had to have to go forward in my recovery. Henry J. Kaiser was the first to recognize the need for a specialized rehabilitation center within Kaiser Permanente and his reasons couldn't have been more personal. In the late 1940s, Henry J. Kaiser's son was diagnosed with multiple sclerosis and treated by the founders of our center. Mr. Kaiser wanted to extend this treatment to the KP members and the Kaiser Foundation Rehabilitation Center, first known as the Cabot Kaiser Institute, was born. From the early days it was recognized that the multiple impairments and disabilities caused by an injury or illness often requires intense and specialized care, particularly in the first phase of recovery. The Kaiser Foundation Rehabilitation Center, or KFRC, has been providing that care and support now for over 60 years. A safe and caring environment that focuses exclusively on promoting recovery, the Kaiser Foundation Rehabilitation Center has been designated as a national center of excellence for individuals with disabilities by the Kaiser Permanente Institute for Culturally Competent Care. KFRC is a 50-bed rehabilitation hospital and outpatient center located within the Kaiser Permanente Vallejo Medical Center, one of 122 hospitals across the U.S. winning the Consumer Choice Award for having the highest quality and the most positive image. Our inpatient and outpatient rehabilitation programs provide care for individuals with disabilities caused by stroke, acquired brain injury, spinal cord injury, multiple sclerosis, neuromuscular disorders, major multiple trauma, amputations, and some orthopedic disorders. Our center combines various therapies and specialized programs with rehabilitation nurses working around the clock and rehabilitation physicians making rounds seven days per week. The Kaiser Foundation Rehabilitation Center understands that rehabilitation can be a long and complicated journey. And beginning that rehabilitation process with maximum support through the interventions of providers with specific expertise, knowledge, and skills goes a long way toward determining a patient's outcome. It's in the first crucial phase with early intervention by a specialized interdisciplinary team that the Kaiser Foundation Rehabilitation Center yields its greatest benefits. The Kaiser Foundation Rehabilitation Center uses a coordinated interdisciplinary approach to lessen the impact of impairments, increase self-sufficiency, enhance coping abilities, increase purposeful activity, and promote community participation. Through the setting of realistic short-term goals, each individual is more likely to achieve their long-term goal of returning to a meaningful life outside our center. Those goals could include climbing Yosemite's half dome, regaining the skills necessary to complete her dream of finishing the illustrations for a children's book, holding her baby, or getting back to the practice of medicine. The Kaiser Foundation Rehabilitation Center knows how to help patients make critical choices at every step of the way. The approach is simple. The patient and his or her family is the center of a comprehensive interdisciplinary rehabilitation team. This comprehensive approach is what sets the Kaiser Foundation Rehabilitation Center apart and is what makes it so successful in helping patients to achieve long-term recovery. This team boasts a world-class group of experts. It includes physiatrists, who are physicians who specialize in physical medicine and rehabilitation. Physiatrists establish both a medical and functional diagnosis and prognosis, and prescribe medications and therapeutic interventions, and orchestrate the various components of the treatment plan. Rehabilitation nurses are available 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. Rehabilitation nurses offer direct care, coordinate the patient's daily schedule, and provide patient and family caregiver education. They're also the frontline patient and family advocates. Physical therapists assist the patient by teaching ways to improve mobility, and they teach patients how to become more functional by the use of wheelchairs, braces, and equipment for transfers and improving mobility. Occupational therapists are trained to help patients optimize participation in activities of daily living in various environments, including home, work, and school. Speech-language pathologists provide interventions for patients with communication and cognitive disorders or swallowing problems related to various conditions. Social workers assist the patient with personal or family issues created by the injury or illness and act as a liaison between the individual, the family, and community resources. Case managers assist the patient and family with issues related to health plan coverage, durable medical equipment costs, and the continuum of care after inpatient rehabilitation. Neuropsychologists provide evaluations of cognitive, emotional, social, and behavioral factors that may be related to the individual's circumstances and develop treatment programs that can address these issues. Recreation therapists promote the patient's reintegration into individual or group activities to develop or foster social skills and constructive use of leisure time. The patient is the focal point of the rehabilitation team that works together to ensure the patient's realistic recovery goals are achieved. Patient and family education occurs throughout the rehabilitation process to help reduce anxieties and fears and promote recovery. What this facility gave me, which I don't think I could have gotten any place else, was an integrated approach to wellness. Each team member with their expertise worked together to make a hole, to make all the parts of me respond and reintegrate and get well at the same time. This is a place where I could experience all the different needs I had being met at once. You can't do that any place else. It's this approach that makes the difference. It is the bridge between disability injury to home. It is the place that allows you to bridge that gap between where you were before your injury or disability to where you're going to be to move on into your life. The Kaiser Foundation Rehabilitation Center understands that the patient's family is an indispensable part of the rehabilitation team. The center works closely with families, helping them understand the nature of their loved one's injury and teaching techniques to support their recovery. When you put all these therapists and everybody together, it makes a whole picture and it's unbelievable what it's done for him. Hospitals which have been into several, for different surgeries, they're very limited as to people visiting you. They're always kicking them out of the room. Here they invite you as a family member to watch the process in progress. He was stiff, he couldn't move. And now, a week later, he can walk, he can talk, he can eat, he can eat by himself. He couldn't do that, couldn't do nothing. So I don't know what to say. I am so grateful for this place. Since reintegration into the community is a principal goal, the center provides places where patients and their families can practice the skills needed to function and progress further in the recovery in the home environment. Here they can also practice working with modified equipment like specially adapted kitchen implements that simplify the transition home. The center sponsors weekly community outings where patients get out of the hospital environment and shop at the local farmer's market. To see that you haven't lost your independence and you're still able to do those things that make you happy that, you know, today is just a good day. With a superb reputation that reaches beyond the borders of Kaiser Permanente, the Kaiser Foundation Rehabilitation Center is recognized as a national and international leader in its field. The Kaiser Foundation Rehabilitation Center is accredited by the Commission on Accreditation of Rehabilitation Facilities. This means that we meet rigorous guidelines for service and quality for our comprehensive inpatient and outpatient programs and specialty care in brain and spinal cord injury rehabilitation. This endorsement recognizes that KFRC programs and services have met consumer-focused state-of-the-art national standards of performance. But our biggest reward is the endorsement of our patients and the smiles and courage and hope on their faces.