Stroke: evaluation of long-term rehabilitation effects

A planned prospective documentation of the course of rehabilitation of 303 stroke patients was undertaken using the Bathel-Index as a measure of basic everyday functions and the Guttman-Scale as a measure of complex activities of daily living. These were determined at the beginning of rehabilitation, after an average of 7 weeks of in-patient treatment and one year following the stroke. Four patterns in the course of rehabilitation could be differentiated. The causes of the differing functional results were investigated. Besides a positive spontaneous progress of the underlaying disease with an early reparation of the neurological deficits it is the premorbid status, the overprotection of the physically disabled and the determinative cognitive and mental functions that decide the long term fate of stroke patients.