Article

We attempted to evaluate the effect of a stretching device for treatment of hand
spasticity in chronic stroke patients. We recruited 21 chronic hemiplegic stroke
patients with severe finger flexor spasticity and randomly assigned them to the
intervention group (10 patients) and control group (11 patients). The stretching
device consisted of a resting hand splint, finger stretcher, and frame. The
stretching state was maintained for 30 seconds and relaxed for the next 30
seconds. This stretching and relaxation were repeated for 20 minutes (one
session). The stretching program was practiced 2 sessions/day and 6 days/week for
3 weeks for the patients of the intervention group. The effect of this stretching
device was assessed using the modified Ashworth scale (MAS) score of finger
flexor muscles. Patients in both groups were assessed six times within an
interval of one week and patients in the intervention group were assessed two
times before starting the stretching program. The two-way repeated measures
analysis of variance (ANOVA) test for evaluation of the effect of intervention
across all time-points between the two groups showed a significant interaction
between time and effect of intervention (P < 0.001). Within the intervention
group, the average of mean MAS score at Pre-1 and Pre-2 were 2.83 and 2.93,
respectively (the difference between Pre-1 and Pre-2 was not significant (P>
0.05)), and this improved significantly to 1.97 at Inter-1, 1.55 at Inter-2, 1.20
at Inter-3, and 1.97 at Post-1 (P < 0.001) using the one-way repeated measures
ANOVA test for evaluation of the effect of intervention across all time-points.
We found that our stretching device was effective in relieving hand spasticity in
chronic stroke patients.

Langue : ANGLAIS