A study of prisms and therapy in attention loss after stroke (SPATIAL): A feasibility randomised controlled trial.

Objective: Investigate feasibility and acceptability of prism adaptation training for people with inattention (spatial neglect), early after stroke, during usual care.

Design: Phase II feasibility randomised controlled trial with 3:1 stratified allocation to standard occupational therapy with or without intervention, and nested process evaluation.

Setting: Ten hospital sites providing in-patient stroke services.

Task-specific reach-to-grasp training after stroke: development and description of a home-based intervention.

Unlabelled: This series of articles for rehabilitation in practice aims to cover a knowledge element of the rehabilitation medicine curriculum. Nevertheless they are intended to be of interest to a multidisciplinary audience. The competency addressed in this article is to transparently describe the process of developing a complex intervention for people after stroke as part of a feasibility randomised controlled trial.

Assessing the impact of upper limb disability following stroke: a qualitative enquiry using internet-based personal accounts of stroke survivors.

Purpose: Upper limb disability following stroke may have multiple effects on the individual. Existing assessment instruments tend to focus on impairment and function and may miss other changes that are personally important. This study aimed to identify personally significant impacts of upper limb disability following stroke.

Evaluation of a prototype tool for communicating body perception disturbances in complex regional pain syndrome.

Patients with Complex Regional Pain Syndrome (CRPS) experience distressing changes in body perception. However representing body perception is a challenge. A digital media tool for communicating body perception disturbances was developed.

Home-based reach-to-grasp training for people after stroke: study protocol for a feasibility randomized controlled trial.

Background: This feasibility study is intended to assess the acceptability of home-based task-specific reach-to-grasp (RTG) training for people with stroke, and to gather data to inform recruitment, retention, and sample size for a definitive randomized controlled trial.

Methods/design: This is to be a randomized controlled feasibility trial recruiting 50 individuals with upper-limb motor impairment after stroke. Participants will be recruited after discharge from hospital and up to 12 months post-stroke from hospital stroke services and community therapy-provider services.

A single blinded randomised controlled pilot trial of prism adaptation for improving self-care in stroke patients with neglect.

Prism adaptation has been shown to alleviate the symptoms of unilateral spatial neglect following stroke in single case and small group studies. The purposes of this single blinded pilot randomised controlled trial were to determine the feasibility of delivering prism adaptation treatment in a clinically valid sample and to assess its impact on self-care. Thirty seven right hemisphere stroke patients with unilateral spatial neglect were randomised into either prism adaptation (using 10 dioptre, 6 degree prisms) or sham treatment (using plain glasses) groups.

Walking and wheelchair navigation in patients with left visual neglect.

Patients with neglect veer to one side when walking or driving a wheelchair, however there is a contradiction in the literature about the direction of this deviation. The study investigated the navigational trajectory of a sample of neglect patients of mixed mobility status in an ecological setting. Fifteen patients with left-sided neglect after right hemisphere stroke were recorded walking or driving a powered wheelchair along a stretch of corridor.

Sensorimotor integration in Complex Regional Pain Syndrome: a transcranial magnetic stimulation study.

There is evidence that patients with Complex Regional Pain Syndrome (CRPS) have altered central sensorimotor processing. Sensory input can influence motor output either through indirect pathways or through direct connections from the sensory to motor cortex. The purpose of this study was to investigate sensorimotor interaction via direct connections in patients with CRPS and to compare the results with normal subjects'.

A pilot randomized controlled trial of a daily muscle stretch regime to prevent contractures in the arm after stroke.

Objective: To evaluate the feasibility and effects of daily stretch positioning for prevention of contractures in stroke patients without arm function.

Design: Randomized controlled pilot study.

Setting: Stroke rehabilitation ward, U.

A multiple case design experiment to investigate the performance and neural effects of a programme for training hand function after stroke.

Objective: To investigate the effects of task-specific practice on hand function in stroke subjects who were given computer-assisted training and to look for associated changes in corticospinal connectivity.

Design: Single case design experiments.

Setting: Subjects' homes.