Upper limb robot-assisted therapy in chronic and subacute stroke patients: a kinematic analysis

The goal of this study is to analyse different effects of upper limb robot-assisted rehabilitation treatment in subacute and chronic stroke subjects through a set of kinematic parameters. Fifty stroke patients, 25 subacute and 25 chronic, and 20 healthy subjects participated in the study. A robotic system for the upper limb rehabilitation was used. Clinical scales were used for assessment. Kinematic parameters were computed. Outcome clinical measures show a decrease in motor impairment after the treatment both in subacute and chronic patients. The kinematic parameters show an improvement between admission and discharge in both groups, though the gain in subacute patients is higher. Our results show that the robot-assisted training can lead to a significant reduction of motor impairment in subacute and chronic stroke patients: clinical outcome measures and kinematic parameters demonstrate this improvement.