pper-Extremity Functional Electric Stimulation–Assisted xercises on a Workstation in the Subacute Phase of troke Recovery

Objective: To test the efficacy of functional electric stimuation (FES) assisted exercise therapy (FES-ET) on a worktation in the subacute phase of recovery from a stroke. Design: Single-blind, randomly controlled comparison of ighand low-intensity treatment. Setting: Laboratory in a rehabilitation hospital. Participants: Nineteen stroke survivors (10 men, 9 women; ean age standard deviation, 60.6 5.8y), with upper-exremity hemiplegia (mean poststroke time, 48 17d). The main nclusion criteria were: stroke occurred within 3 months of nset of trial and resulted in severe upper-limb dysfunction, nd FES produced adequate hand opening. Intervention: An FES stimulator and an exercise workstaion with instrumented objects were used by 2 groups to perorm specific motor tasks with their affected upper extremity. en subjects in the high-intensity FES-ET group received ES-ET for 1 hour a day on 15 to 20 consecutive workdays. ine subjects in the low-intensity FES-ET group received 15 inutes of sensory electric stimulation 4 days a week and on he fifth day they received 1 hour of FES-ET. Main Outcome Measures: Primary outcome measure inluded the Wolf Motor Function Test (WMFT). Secondary utcome measures included the Motor Activity Log (MAL), he upper-extremity portion of the Fugl-Meyer Assessment FMA), and the combined kinematic score (CKS) derived from orkstation measurements. The WMFT, MAL, and FMA were sed to assess function in the absence of FES whereas CKS as used to evaluate function assisted by FES. Results: Improvements in the WMFT and CKS were sigificantly greater in the high-intensity group (post-treatment ffect size, .95) than the low-intensity group (post-treatment ffect size, 1.3). The differences in MAL and FMA were not tatistically significant. Conclusions: Subjects performing high-intensity FES-ET howed significantly greater improvements on the WMFT than