Upper extremity training with CUREs robot in subacute stroke: A pilot study

Abstract

We developed a robot, CUREs (Chulalongkorn University Rehabilitation robotic Exoskeleton system), for upper extremity rehabilitation. Five subacute stroke patients participated in this pilot study. All patients had severe upper extremity weakness (Brunnstrom stage I and II, Fugl–Meyer Assessment Upper Extremity score, motor function, are from 4 to 10). They participated in 30 min of conventional upper extremity training and 30 min of robotic training, 5 days per week for 2 consecutive weeks. The Fugl–Meyer Assessment Upper Extremity Scale was improved after 2 weeks training in all participants. However, the Motor Assessment Scale was not changed. In the future, we plan to conduct a 4 week randomized–controlled trial study to compare the rehabilitation outcome between CUREs robot with conventional therapy in stroke patient.