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The Ability to Manage Stairs for Chronic Stroke Survivors Improves with Increases in Physical Activity Levels

Marina B Pinheiro, Janaíne C Polese, Gustavo C Machado, Christina DCM Faria, Tânia L Hirochi and Luci F Teixeira-Salmela

Background: The ability to manage stairs has been recognized as the best predictor of physical activity levels in the community, when compared to walking speed and walking capacity. In addition, one third of stroke survivors require some assistance to manage stairs at six and 12 months post-stroke. Therefore, the aim of this study was to compare the ability to manage stairs for a large sample of chronic stroke survivors, based upon by their physical activity levels.

Methods: The participants were recruited from the general community and had their general levels of physical activity assessed by the Human Activity Profile (HAP). Their physical activity levels were classified based upon their HAP’s adjusted activity scores as impaired (<53), moderately active (53-74), or active (>74). The ability to manage stairs was determined by the stair ascent and descent cadences (stairs/s). One-way analyses of variance (ANOVAs), followed by LSD post-hoc tests, were employed to compare the differences between the groups regarding their stair cadences.

Results: Ninety-five chronic stroke survivors were evaluated with a mean age of 55.74 ± 12.3 years, a mean time since the onset of stroke of 64.4 ± 5.6 months, and a mean gait speed of 0.92 ± 0.35 m/s. Twenty five participants were classified as impaired, 53 as moderately active, and 17 as active. Thirteen participants used handrails to perform the stair tests, three from the impaired group and 10 from the moderately active group. ANOVAs revealed significant differences between the impaired, moderately active, and active groups for both stair ascent and descent cadencies [F=18.49 (2,92); p<0.01 and F=16.06 (2,92); p<0.01, respectively], indicating that increases in cadences were observed with increases in physical activity levels.

Conclusions: Chronic stroke survivors with different physical activity levels demonstrated different abilities to manage stairs. Increases in stair ascent and descent cadences were 3 observed with increases in physical activity levels.