Deans' stroke musings: Functional Deficits in the Less-Impaired Arm of Stroke Survivors Depend on Hemisphere of Damage and Extent of Paretic Arm Impairment

Changing stroke rehab and research worldwide now.Time is Brain! trillions and trillions of neurons that DIE each day because there are NO effective hyperacute therapies besides tPA(only 12% effective). I have 523 posts on hyperacute therapy, enough for researchers to spend decades proving them out. These are my personal ideas and blog on stroke rehabilitation and stroke research. Do not attempt any of these without checking with your medical provider. Unless you join me in agitating, when you need these therapies they won't be there.

What this blog is for:

My blog is not to help survivors recover, it is to have the 10 million yearly stroke survivors light fires underneath their doctors, stroke hospitals and stroke researchers to get stroke solved. 100% recovery. The stroke medical world is completely failing at that goal, they don't even have it as a goal. Shortly after getting out of the hospital and getting NO information on the process or protocols of stroke rehabilitation and recovery I started searching on the internet and found that no other survivor received useful information. This is an attempt to cover all stroke rehabilitation information that should be readily available to survivors so they can talk with informed knowledge to their medical staff. It lays out what needs to be done to get stroke survivors closer to 100% recovery. It's quite disgusting that this information is not available from every stroke association and doctors group.

Tuesday, September 24, 2019

Functional Deficits in the Less-Impaired Arm of Stroke Survivors Depend on Hemisphere of Damage and Extent of Paretic Arm Impairment

So nothing for stroke survivors to get recovered. Useless.

Functional Deficits in the Less-Impaired Arm of Stroke Survivors Depend on Hemisphere of Damage and Extent of Paretic Arm Impairment

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Candice Maenza, MS

, David C. Good, MD*, Carolee J. Winstein, PhD*, ...

First Published September 20, 2019 Research Article

Abstract

Background. Previous research has detailed the hemisphere dependence and specific kinematic deficits observed for the less-affected arm of patients with unilateral stroke.
Objective. We now examine whether functional motor deficits in the less-affected arm, measured by standardized clinical measures of motor function, also depend on the hemisphere that was damaged and on the severity of contralesional impairment.
Methods. We recruited 48 left-hemisphere-damaged (LHD) participants, 62 right-hemisphere-damaged participants, and 54 age-matched control participants. Measures of motor function included the following: (1) Jebsen-Taylor Hand Function Test (JHFT), (2) Grooved Pegboard Test (GPT), and (3) grip strength. We measured the extent of contralesional arm impairment with the upper-extremity component of the Fugl-Meyer (UEFM) assessment of motor impairment.
Results. Ipsilesional limb functional performance deficits (JHFT) varied with both the damaged hemisphere and severity of contralesional arm impairment, with the most severe deficits expressed in LHD participants with severe contralesional impairment (UEFM). GPT and grip strength varied with severity of contralesional impairment but not with hemisphere.
Conclusions. Stroke survivors with the most severe paretic arm impairment, who must rely on their ipsilesional arm for performing daily activities, have the greatest motor deficit in the less-affected arm. We recommend remediation of this arm to improve functional independence in this group of stroke patients.

Keywords stroke, ipsilesional deficits, motor lateralization, hemisphere-specific deficits, functional deficits