Article

Hesitation between moving from a sedentary posture (lying/sitting) to
walking is a characteristic of mobility impaired individuals,
as identified from
laboratory studies. Knowing the extent to which this hesitation occurs during
everyday life would benefit rehabilitation research.
This study aimed to quantify
this transition hesitation through a novel approach to analysing data from a
physical activity monitor based on a tri-axial accelerometer and compare results
from two populations; stroke patients and age-matched unimpaired controls.
METHODS: Stroke patients living at home with early supported discharge (n=34,
68.9YO+/-11.8) and age-matched controls (n=30, 66.8YO+/-10.5) wore a physical
activity monitor for 48h. The outputs from the monitor were then used to
determine the transitions from sedentary to walking.
The time delay between a
sedentary posture ending and the start of walking classified four transition
types: 1) fluent (<=2s), 2) hesitant (>2s<=10s), 3) separated (>10s) and 4) a
change from sedentary with no registered walking to a return to sedentary.
RESULTS: Control participants initiated walking after a sedentary posture on 92%
of occasions. Most commonly (43%) this was a fluent transition. In contrast
stroke patients walked after changing from a sedentary posture on 68% of
occasions with only 9% of transitions classed as fluent,
(p<0.05).
CONCLUSION: A new data analysis technique reports the frequency of walking
following a change in sedentary position in stroke patients and healthy controls
and characterises this transition according to the time delay before walking.
This technique creates opportunities to explore everyday mobility in greater depth.
CI - Copyright (c) 2016 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.

Langue : ANGLAIS