The Hamiltonian of a quantum rod with an ellipsoidal boundary is given after a coordinate transformation that changes the ellipsoidal boundary into a spherical one. The properties of the quantum rods constituting the bridge between two-dimensional quantum wells, zero-dimensional quantum dots and one-dimensional quantum wires are explored theoretically using linear combination operator method. The first internal excited state energy, the excitation energy and the transition frequency between the first internal excited and the ground states of the strong-coupled impurity-bound polaron in the rod with Coulomb-bound potential, the transverse effective confinement length, the ellipsoid aspect ratio and the electron–phonon coupling strength are studied. It is found that the first internal excited state energy, the excitation energy and the transition frequency are increasing functions of the Coulomb-bound potential and the electron–phonon coupling strength, whereas they are decreasing functions of the ellipsoid aspect ratio and the transverse effective confinement length. These results can be attributed to the interesting quantum size confining effects.