Article

The assessment of walking function alterations is a key issue to design effective
rehabilitative interventions in sub-acute stroke patients. Nevertheless, the
objective quantification of these alterations remains a challenge. Clinical
rating scales are commonly used in clinical practice, but have been proven prone
to errors associated to the evaluator subjective perception. On the other hand,
instrumental measurement of trunk acceleration can be exploited for an objective
quantitative characterization of gait function, but it is not applied in routine
clinical practice, because the resulting quantitative indexes have not been
related to the clinically information, conventionally provided by the rating
scales. To overcome this limitation, the relationship between the indexes, in
specific clinical conditions, and rating scale must be better investigated, to
support their exploitability in the clinical practice as a fast and reliable
screening tool. Thirty-one sub-acute stroke patients (17 with and 14 without
cane) participated in the study. All were assessed with 6 rating scales (MI, TCT,
MRI, FAC, WHS, CIRS) and 2 functional tests (2MWT and TUG). Sample Entropy (SEN)
and Recurrence Quantification Analysis (RQA) in AP, ML and V directions were
calculated over 2MWT and walking section of TUG.
The influence of assessment task
and cane was analysed, as well as correlation of SEN and RQA indexes with
clinical rating scales. SEN and RQA on the medio-lateral plane resulted
influenced by the use of the cane, while the correlations between indexes and
clinical scales showed that SEN and RQA for antero-posterior direction correlate
positively with WHS.
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Langue : ANGLAIS