Correlations between the muscle strength of lower limbs and the number of falls in chronic hemiparesis

Abstract

© 2015 Universidade Federal de Sao Paulo. All rights reserved. Objective. To investigate whether there were significant associations between measures of strength of the lower limb muscles and the number of falls in chronic stroke individuals. Method. It is an exploratory study, where the isometric strength of the hip flexors, knee extensors and flexors was obtained with the hand dynamometer, and number of falls with direct questions. Pearson correlation coefficients were calculated for analysis. Results. 90 subjects (mean age of 58 years, mean time since stroke of 71.5±68 (6-380) months) participated. Inverse, and fair correlations were found between the number of falls over the past six months and strength of the paretic hip flexors (r=-0.28; p < 0.01), knee extensors (r=-0.30; p < 0.01), and knee flexors (r=- 0.29; p < 0.01). Inverse, and fair correlations were also between the number of falls over the last year and strength of the paretic hip flexors (r=-0.29; p < 0.01), knee flexors (r=-0.32; p < 0.01), and knee extensors (r=-0.30; p < 0.01). No correlations were found with any of the strength measures of the non-paretic limb muscles (0.18 < r < p < 0.24). Conclusions. Correlations were found between measures of strength of the paretic lower limb muscles and number of falls over the past six months and last year in chronic stroke individuals.