Stroke Rehabilitation: Outcome Based on Brunnstrom Recovery Stages

Rehabilitation outcome based on Brunnstrom recovery stages following comprehensive rehabilitation was examined for a sample of 98 inpatients with cerebrovascular accident and resulting hemiplegia or hemiparesis. Using admission and discharge dates retrieved from a computer-based patient information system, frequency distributions, cross-tabulations, and Spearman's correlations were computed. Regardless of severity of paralysis, length of stay, and time of admission from onset, patients tended to improve at all levels of recovery stages. The stage of recovery at admission seemed to set the probable upper limit on how far patients were likely to progress. The strong positive correlations between recovery at admission and discharge on all measures for arm, hand, and leg recovery, with or without proprioception, seem to indicate that recovery in hemiplegia is a global phenomenon.