Hope Starts Here. Get Your Life Back After Brain or Spinal Cord Injury.

Rehabilitation is designed to help an individual regain independence and improve quality of life by restoring function as close as possible to pre-injury or pre-illness levels. A common example is an elderly woman who falls and fractures her hip. She receives outpatient physical therapy and, after approximately 12–15 visits, is able to safely return to her normal daily activities.

Habilitation often becomes necessary when that same individual has additional co-existing medical conditions, such as a prior mild-to-moderate stroke and Type II diabetes, which slow the recovery process. In many cases, the individual may not progress quickly enough to meet insurance payer guidelines for continued therapy services. At discharge, she may be prescribed a wheelchair for safety and fall prevention, even though she may still have the potential to regain walking ability with additional training and support.

With access to ongoing habilitation services, she may continue learning to safely use a walker or rollator over the next several months. However, these services are frequently not covered by traditional insurance and often require out-of-pocket payment. While a 3–5 month habilitation program may have a out-of-cost of approximately $1,500–$2,000, this investment can be far less expensive than the alternatives, such as in-home caregiving, which may exceed $6,000 per month, or nursing home care, which can exceed $16,000 per month.

In the United States, habilitation services have historically been fragmented across multiple systems, including healthcare, developmental disability services, education, Medicaid waiver programs, vocational rehabilitation, and community-based organizations. This fragmentation is one of the primary reasons long-term access to habilitation remains inconsistent and difficult to navigate.

The founders of Moving With HOPE recognized this fragmentation in 1979, stemming from personal experiences with their parents after major health setbacks at young ages. In 1980, they began developing a community-based delivery model designed to provide affordable, year-round access to habilitation services. In 1984, they opened LifeDesigns ReAbility Center, possibly the first outpatient habiliation center dedicated to restore health and wellness in survivors of conditions like stroke, cancers, heart disease, spinal cord injury and Parkinson's Disease.

The goal of habilitation is not simply to restore previous function, but to enhance an individual’s ability to safely participate in everyday life by developing new skills, improving functional capacity, supporting long-term wellness, and maximizing independence despite chronic neurological or musculoskeletal limitations.

Both rehabilitation and habilitation play essential and complementary roles within the continuum of care, and each can profoundly improve an individual’s quality of life. Moving With HOPE is ready to help you or a loved one get back on the track to your best recovery!