Body Awareness Therapy for People With Stroke

Affected balance capacity is common after a stroke due to paresis and sensory disturbances. The affected balance capacity may cause walking disturbances, falls and decreased mobility. Balance may be improved by physical therapy. A possible method for balance training is body awareness therapy, that was introduced in Sweden by Jacques Dropsy and Gertrud Roxendal. Earlier body awareness therapy was mostly used in psychiatric care but in the recent years the method has been used for people with long-tern pain, amputations and multiple sclerosis. Body awareness therapy includes exercises in lying, sitting and standing. Focus of the exercises are awareness of one´s movement behaviour, breathing patterns, resources and limitations. Postural control is an essential part in the exercises. Body awareness therapy could be used for people with stroke as a way to improve postural control. The aim of this study is to investigate if balance training using body awareness therapy can improve balance and walking in people after stroke. The interventions consists of body awareness therapy once a week for 8 weeks.

Once a week, 1 hour for 8 weeks.Body awareness training may be performed by physiotherapist. Exercises are performed in standing, sitting and lying. Example of exercises are weight-balancing in standing and relaxation exercises.

Test of functional balance. Includes 14 items all graded 0-4 where 0 indicate larger impairment. Total score is used here, maximum 56 and minimum 0. The Berg balance scale was developed for older patients but is a much used meausure of dynamic and static functional balance.

test of functional mobility. Time is taken in seconds. The participants sits on a chair with armrests are then asked to rise, walk 3 meters, turn and walk back and sit down.

16 item questionnaire that investigates balance self-efficacy. Each items is a question; How secure are you that you will not fall when you...sweep the floor? The participant are asked to grade his/hers feeling of secutiry from 0, 10, 20 and so on up to 100. 0 is regarded low balance self-efficacy. The item responses are summed and divided by 16.

Inclusion Criteria: Diagnosed stroke more than 6 months ago. Walking capacity of 100 meter with or without assistive device. Exclusion Criteria: Medical or cognitive impairment that prohibits participating in the intervention.