How to gain evidence in neurorehabilitation: a personal view

Neurorehabilitation is an emerging field driven by developments in neuroscience and biomedical engineering. Most patients that require neurorehabilitation have had a stroke, but other diseases of the brain, spinal cord, or nerves can also be alleviated. Modern therapies in neurorehabilitation focus on reducing impairment and improving function in daily life. As compared with acute care medicine, the clinical evidence for most neurorehabilitative treatments (modern or conventional) is sparse. Clinical trials support constraint-induced movement therapy for the arm and aerobic treadmill training for walking, both high-intensity interventions requiring therapist time (i.e., cost) and patient motivation. Promising approaches for the future include robotic training, telerehabilitation at the patient’s home, and supportive therapies that promote motivation and compliance. It is argued that a better understanding of the neuroscience of recovery together with results from small-scale and well-focused clinical experiments are necessary to design optimal interventions for specific target groups of patients.