Effectiveness of a sensor-based technology in upper limb motor recovery in post-acute stroke neurorehabilitation: a randomized controlled trial

Sensor-based technological therapy devices could be a possible neurorehabilitation strategy for motor rehabilitation in patients with stroke during the post-acute hospitalization, especially for treating upper extremities function limitations. The audio-visual feedback devices are characterized by interactive therapy games that allow training the movement of shoulders, elbows, and wrist, measuring the strength and the active range of motion of upper limb, registering data in an electronic database to quantitatively monitoring measures and therapy progress. This study aimed to investigate the effects of sensor-based motor rehabilitation in add-on to the conventional neurorehabilitation for improving the upper limb functions in patients with subacute stroke. Thirty-seven patients were enrolled in the study and randomly assigned to the experimental group and the control group. The training consisting of twelve sessions of upper limb training compared with twelve sessions of upper limb sensory-motor training, without robotic support. Both rehabilitation programs were performed for 40 minutes three times a week, for 4 weeks, in addition to conventional therapy. All patients were evaluated at the baseline (T0) and after 4 weeks of training (T1). The within-subject analysis showed a statistically significant improvement in both groups in all clinical scales. The analysis of effectiveness revealed that, compared with baseline (T0), the improvement percentage in the Modified Barthel Index was greater in the experimental group than the control group. The use of a sensor-based training with audio-video-feedback could be a useful complementary strategy for improving upper limb motor functions in patients with stroke during post-acute neurorehabilitation.