Improving arm function after a stroke

How our research benefits to society

Evidence based training in the rehabilitation center

Our academic rehabilitation center Beatrixoord provides the perfect location to perform clinical research. A few years ago, the circuit class training program for the upper limb was developed by a group of therapists from our center. Although being thoroughly studied for the lower limb (van der Port et al., 2009), the upper limb program has never been validated. In this project, we investigate different variables such as the effectiveness on upper limb improvement, the enjoyment of the patient and the workload of the therapist. We aim for a circuit class training program for the upper limb which is able to improve the upper limb function, is enjoyable for the patient and provides a low workload for the therapists. As such, patients and therapist are closely involved during this study. The final version of the circuit class training will be shared online, available for other rehabilitation centers to implement in their training.

Telerehabilitation: training at home

When patients are dismissed from the rehabilitation center, the training intensity is immediately reduced. To provide patients with the possibility to train at home, an assistive device named the ArmAssist (Tecnalia, San Sebastian, Spain) was upgraded to be used at home. By adding a telecare platform (GMV, Madrid, Spain), patients were able to train independently while still being monitored by a therapist. As part of a consortium with different stakeholders, UMCG was involved in the clinical part of the project, by testing the device with patients.