Effects of Arm Weight Support Training to Promote Recovery of Upper Limb Function for Subacute Patients after Stroke with Different Levels of Arm Impairments.

Purpose. The goal of this study was to investigate the effects of arm weight support training using the ArmeoSpring for subacute patients after stroke with different levels of hemiplegic arm impairments. Methods. 48 inpatients with subacute stroke, stratified into 3 groups from mild to severe upper extremity impairment, were engaged in ArmeoSpring training for 45 minutes daily, 5 days per week for 3 weeks, in addition to conventional rehabilitation. Evaluations were conducted at three measurement occasions: immediately before training (T1); immediately after training (T2); and at a 3-week follow-up (T3) by a blind rater. Results. Shoulder flexion active range of motion, Upper Extremity Scores in the Fugl-Meyer Assessment (FMA), and Vertical Catch had the greatest differences in gain scores for patients between severe and moderate impairments, whereas FMA Hand Scores had significant differences in gain scores between moderate and mild impairments. There was no significant change in muscle tone or hand-path ratios between T1, T2, and T3 within the groups. Conclusion. Arm weight support training is beneficial for subacute stroke patients with moderate to severe arm impairments, especially to improve vertical control such as shoulder flexion, and there were no adverse effects in muscle tone.

A study of the reliability and validity of the Chinese version of the Dementia Rating Scale.

BACKGROUND: The present study aims to develop and validate a Chinese version of the Dementia Rating Scale (DRS) for use with Chinese populations in psychogeriatric settings. METHODS: The DRS was translated into Chinese and its content validity was evaluated by an 11-member expert panel. To assess reliability and concurrent validity, 52 subjects with dementia were recruited from medical and psychogeriatric settings using purposive sampling. RESULTS: With percentage of agreement as an indicator, 28 out of 36 items (78%) had satisfactory content validity. Items with a percentage of agreement below 70% were reviewed and modified, based on the comments of the experts. The CDRS had excellent test-retest and inter-rater reliability, with intraclass correlation coefficient (ICC) at 0.94 and 0.93 respectively. Intraclass correlation coefficients ranged between 0.75 and 0.89 for the subscales. The internal consistency of the CDRS subscale, as measured by Cronbach's a, ranged from 0.57 to 0.82. The CDRS had high correlations with the Chinese Mini-mental State Examination (r = 0.80 for total score, r = 0.58 to 0.84 for subscales. CONCLUSIONS: The CDRS is a valid instrument for the assessment of dementia in Chinese-speaking subjects.