An effective balancing response to lateral perturbations at pelvis level during slow walking requires control in all three planes of motion.

In this study we investigated balancing responses to lateral perturbations during slow walking (0.85m/s). A group of seven healthy individuals walked on an instrumented treadmill while being perturbed at the level of waist at left heel strike in outward and inward lateral directions.

A Cloud-Based Virtual Reality App for a Novel Telemindfulness Service: Rationale, Design and Feasibility Evaluation.

Background: Worldwide, there has been a marked increase in stress and anxiety, also among patients with traumatic brain injury (TBI). Access to psychology services is limited, with some estimates suggesting that over 50% of sufferers are not accessing the existing services available to them for reasons such as inconvenience, embarrassment, or stigmatization concerns around mental health. Health service providers have increasingly been turning to drug-free therapies, such as mindfulness programs, as complementary treatments.

Lasting relief of chronic anterior knee pain in young adult after ten weekly inductive physiotherapy sessions: A case report.

Background: Patellofemoral pain syndrome particularly impairs quality of life in young, physically active subjects. The exact etiology remains unknown, and so this syndrome is a challenging condition to treat. Some patients continue to experience pain and dysfunction after receiving one or more guidelines-compliant conservative treatments.

Competitive and cooperative arm rehabilitation games played by a patient and unimpaired person: effects on motivation and exercise intensity.

Background: People with chronic arm impairment should exercise intensely to regain their abilities, but frequently lack motivation, leading to poor rehabilitation outcome. One promising way to increase motivation is through interpersonal rehabilitation games, which allow patients to compete or cooperate together with other people. However, such games have mainly been evaluated with unimpaired subjects, and little is known about how they affect motivation and exercise intensity in people with chronic arm impairment.

End-of-life decisions in 34 Slovene Intensive Care Units: a nationwide prospective clinical study.

Background: The aim of this study was to determine how end-of-life decisions (EOLD) on limitations of life-sustaining treatment (LST) are made in three different types of intensive care units (ICUs) in Slovenia.

Methods: A national multicenter prospective study among 31 adult and three pediatric/neonatal ICUs (PICUs). The questionnaire form on EOLD was designed to assess the clinical practice.

Prospective memory 7 years after severe childhood traumatic brain injury - the TGE 2 prospective longitudinal study.

Objective: To investigate the long-term outcome in prospective memory (PM), seven years after childhood severe traumatic brain injury (TBI), in a prospective longitudinal cohort.

Participants: 76 young individuals (aged 7-22 years): 39 patients with a severe accidental TBI included prospectively seven years earlier, aged 0-15 years at injury, and 37 controls individually matched on age, gender and parental education.

Main Outcome Measures: Three novel short PM tasks varying in the delay, motivation and context (ecological versus paper and pencil task).

Phantom motor execution facilitated by machine learning and augmented reality as treatment for phantom limb pain: a single group, clinical trial in patients with chronic intractable phantom limb pain.

Background: Phantom limb pain is a debilitating condition for which no effective treatment has been found. We hypothesised that re-engagement of central and peripheral circuitry involved in motor execution could reduce phantom limb pain via competitive plasticity and reversal of cortical reorganisation.

Methods: Patients with upper limb amputation and known chronic intractable phantom limb pain were recruited at three clinics in Sweden and one in Slovenia.

The effects of different types of ankle-foot orthoses on postural responses in individuals with walking impairments.

The aim of this study was to examine the immediate and long-term effects of different ankle-foot orthosis (AFO) types on postural responses in patients with various pathological conditions who, because of their walking disorders, wore an AFO. A total of 37 patients with different pathological conditions who visited the outpatient clinic for orthotics because of walking problems, already used or were referred for an AFO and had no other impairments that may influence balance were included in the study. The participants were divided into four groups according to the type of AFO that they wore.

Importance of an education programme for patients with chronic widespread pain.

The structured education programme for patients with chronic widespread pain is the first stage of the interdisciplinary group-based rehabilitation programme for those patients at the University Rehabilitation Institute in Ljubljana, Slovenia. The aim of our pilot study was to investigate the impact of the education programme on the patients' attribution of pain as dangerous. Ninety-three participants with chronic widespread pain volunteered for the study.

Overground gait training using a motorized assistive device in patients with severe disabilities after stroke.

Regaining of the patient's ability to walk after stroke is an important goal of rehabilitation programmes. The ultimate goal of gait rehabilitation is to empower patients for overground walking. We have previously developed a prototype of a therapist-controlled mobile platform with compliant pelvis support mechanism that enables balance training during overground walking (device E-go).

Executive function after severe childhood traumatic brain injury - Age-at-injury vulnerability periods: The TGE prospective longitudinal study.

Background: Executive function (EF) impairment is a major predictor of overall outcome after traumatic brain injury (TBI). TBI severity is a factor of poor outcome, but most studies include a majority of children with mild and moderate TBI. The aims of this study were to estimate EF impairment after severe childhood TBI and to explore factors predicting EF outcome.

A novel robot for imposing perturbations during overground walking: mechanism, control and normative stepping responses.

Background: The most common approach to studying dynamic balance during walking is by applying perturbations. Previous studies that investigated dynamic balance responses predominantly focused on applying perturbations in frontal plane while walking on treadmill. The goal of our work was to develop balance assessment robot (BAR) that can be used during overground walking and to assess normative balance responses to perturbations in transversal plane in a group of neurologically healthy individuals.

Optimizing the Management of Disabling Spasticity Following Spinal Cord Damage: The Ability Network-An International Initiative.

Optimizing the treatment of disabling spasticity in persons with spinal cord damage is hampered by a lack of consensus regarding the use of acceptable definitions of spasticity and disabling spasticity, and the relative absence of decision tools such as clinical guidelines and concise algorithms to support decision-making within the broader clinical community. Many people with spinal cord damage are managed outside specialist centers, and variations in practice result in unequal access to best practice despite equal need. In order to address these issues, the Ability Network-an international panel of clinical experts-was initiated to develop management algorithms to guide and standardize the assessment, treatment, and evaluation of outcomes of persons with spinal cord damage and disabling spasticity.

Evaluation of the Efficacy and Robustness of a Second Generation Implantable Stimulator in a Patient With Hemiplegia During 20 Years of Functional Electrical Stimulation of the Common Peroneal Nerve.

We evaluated the efficacy and robustness of a second generation implantable stimulator for correcting drop foot (DF) in a patient with left-sided hemiplegia over 20 years of functional electrical stimulation (FES) of the common peroneal nerve (CPN). Dorsal flexion and eversion of the affected foot was partially restored by FES of the superficial region of the CPN innervating mostly the tibialis anterior (TA) and partly peroneus longus (PL) and peroneus brevis (PB) muscles. The reasons for implant failure during the long-term follow-up assessment were analyzed and resolving procedures were identified.

The clinical utility of the Canadian Occupational Performance Measure in vocational rehabilitation: A qualitative study among occupational therapists in Slovenia.

Background: Few studies exist on the clinical utility of the Canadian Occupational Performance Measure (COPM) in vocational rehabilitation.

Objective: The aim of this study was to explore how Slovenian occupational therapists working in vocational rehabilitation, perceived the usefulness of the COPM in their everyday practice.

Methods: A qualitative study using two focus group discussions was conducted.

Long-term recovery of muscle strength after denervation in the fibular division of the sciatic nerve.

Introduction: The probability and degree of muscle recovery after lesions of long peripheral nerves have not been assessed quantitatively.

Methods: Twelve adults with closed injuries of the fibular division of the sciatic nerve with complete denervation of associated muscles were followed-up for 2-10 years. The onset of reinnervation was detected electromyographically.

Evaluation of a smartphone human activity recognition application with able-bodied and stroke participants.

Background: Mobile health monitoring using wearable sensors is a growing area of interest. As the world's population ages and locomotor capabilities decrease, the ability to report on a person's mobility activities outside a hospital setting becomes a valuable tool for clinical decision-making and evaluating healthcare interventions. Smartphones are omnipresent in society and offer convenient and suitable sensors for mobility monitoring applications.

Effectiveness of a fall-risk reduction programme for inpatient rehabilitation after stroke.

Purpose: To evaluate effectiveness of fall-risk-assessment-based fall prevention for stroke rehabilitation inpatients.

Method: A consecutive series of 232 patients admitted for the first time to a subacute stroke-rehabilitation ward during 2010-2011 was studied in detail. The Assessment Sheet for Fall Prediction in Stroke Inpatients (ASFPSI by Nakagawa et al.

Attitudes of Slovene paediatricians to end-of-life care.

Aims: The aims of this study were to assess the attitudes of Slovene paediatricians to aspects of end-of-life (EOL) care and compare these attitudes between paediatric intensivists, paediatric specialists and paediatric residents.

Methods: We performed a cross-sectional survey, using a specifically designed 43-item anonymous questionnaire.

Results: We included 323 out of 586 Slovene paediatricians and residents, while 46.

Proposed Criteria for Appraising Goal Attainment Scales Used as Outcome Measures in Rehabilitation Research.

Goal Attainment Scaling (GAS) is a method for writing personalized evaluation scales to quantify progress toward defined rehabilitation goals. In the published literature, GAS methodology is used with different levels of rigor, ranging from precisely written GAS scales that ensure minimal bias and explicitly describe 5 levels of goal attainment to subjective ratings of goal attainment by adjectives (eg, worse/better than expected), which are transformed into a T score, wrongly giving the reader the impression of a truly standardized, interval scale. A drawback of GAS methodology is that it is highly dependent on the ability of the GAS setting team/person to generate valid, reliable, and meaningful scales; therefore, reliability and validity of GAS scales are idiosyncratic to each study.

Impact of silicone prosthesis on hand function, grip power and grip-force tracking ability after finger amputation.

Background: Literature mostly describes the cosmetic role of prostheses for finger amputation. The impact on hand function has not been systematically explored.

Objectives: Our aim was to describe the impact of silicone finger prostheses on hand function and gripping ability.

Training of selective attention in work-active stroke patients.

The aim was to examine the effects of computer-based cognitive rehabilitation of attention in work-active patients after stroke. The study included 11 patients treated as inpatients at the University Rehabilitation Institute, Republic of Slovenia, who were included in intensive selective attention training four times a week for 3 months. Each patient was assessed at the initial and the final rehabilitation stage with the TAP system (Test of Attentional Performance), alertness, and divided attention tasks.

A survey of overuse problems in patients with acquired or congenital upper limb deficiency.

Background: Little is known about secondary impairments and overuse problems in patient with acquired or congenital upper limb deficiency.

Objectives: Our aim was to estimate the frequency of overuse problems in persons after unilateral upper limb deficiency and identify the factors relevant for development of these problems.

Study Design: Cross-sectional study conducted at the University Rehabilitation Institute in Ljubljana.

Influence of finger amputation on grip strength and objectively measured hand function: a descriptive cross-sectional study.

Finger amputations are common and hands are essential for functioning, but studies on factors influencing functioning after finger amputation are lacking. Therefore, we aimed to explore the influence of the number and level of amputated fingers on hand function and grip strength. A prospective descriptive cross-sectional study involving 69 patients with partial or complete amputation of one or more fingers of one hand was carried out.