Muscle Synergies During Gait of Functionally-Dependent Subacute Stroke Survivors Before and After Robotic Rehabilitation

Stroke affects the neuromuscular control of humans, influencing muscle coordination and consequently gait patterns. Robotic devices can be useful to improve walking function and kinematics after stroke, but there is not much research related to muscle coordination through muscle synergies. This is the first study in which muscle synergies have been studied in functionally-dependent subacute post-stroke patients (FAC <2) in a robotic rehabilitation context. We analyzed muscle synergies during gait of three post- stroke patients before and after 2 months of robotic rehabilitation and correlated the results with functional improvements and kinematic changes. After the rehabilitation, patients walked faster, more independently, with normalized gait patterns and different muscle coordination. However, the results obtained underline the importance of a patient- specific therapeutic approach guided by the combination of multi-level metrics.