Virtual Reality Rehabilitation Protocol for Sensory-motor Rehabilitation After a Stoke

Summary

Introduction: Stroke is the second leading cause of death in Europe. In the case of stroke survival (almost 70%), only 25% of patients recover completely, while the remaining 75% will undergo a rehabilitation phase that varying from months to years. The main consequences of a stroke include motor disability of the upper limbs, which involves a partial or complete inability to move the right or left limb, depending on the damaged hemisphere. Furthermore, the motor deficit distorts the proprioception of the body and the embodiment ability of the injured limb. This could be rehabilitated through the paradigm of body illusion that modulates the motor rehabilitation. The present protocol aims to investigate the effectiveness of a Virtual Reality system for sensorimotor and proprioception upper limb deficit compared to a traditional upper limb rehabilitation program.

Method: This study has a randomized and controlled design with control and experimental groups, a 1:1 allocation ratio, and 4 measurement times: pre-intervention, immediately after the intervention, and two follow-ups (at 6 and 12 months). The inclusion criteria are: (a) Being 18 to 85 years old, both males and females; (b) Suffering from ischemic or hemorrhagic stroke; (c) The stroke event must have occurred from two to eighteen months before recruitment; (d) Patients must have moderate to severe upper limb motor deficit, and the alteration of sensorimotor and proprioception abilities of the injury upper limb; (e) Patients must understand and sign the written consent for enrolment. The rehabilitation last four weeks with three sessions per week at Bellaria Hospital of Bologna (Italy). The VR protocol uses two types of technology: immersive and non-immersive, and the control group follow the traditional rehabilitation program.

Ethics and dissemination: The protocol was accepted by the Local Ethics Committee (ASL\_BO n. 0115481) and the clinical trial was promoted.

Conditions

• Stroke

Interventions

DEVICE

Virtual Reality Rehabilitation System

Participants of the experimental group will undergo treatment with Virtual Reality, both IVR and HB. The intervention will consist of 12 sessions lasting about 1 hour each and carried out with a frequency of three days per week within four weeks. Before starting the rehabilitation, arm illusion with the Handbox is inducted to explore the ability of the patients to perceive the virtual arm as their own. During this task, patients sit on a chair with the injured arm inside the Handbox and are invited to perform slow movements with the hand, such as moving the fingers one at a time and moving the wrist up and down. Moreover, they are invited to keep their attention to the virtual arm project on the screen that follows their natural movements. The arm illusion lasts 3 minutes, and the embodiment questionnaire is administered. Then, the treatment starts with IVR and HB sessions, which are counterbalanced to avoid the learning effect

BEHAVIORAL

Traditional therapy

Participants randomly assigned to the control group will receive rehabilitation treatment as per usual clinical practice. Specifically, patients will be directed to rehabilitation facilities according to standard clinical rehabilitation pathways. They will be assigned to a physiotherapist who will administer the rehabilitation treatment for the upper limb impairment. Patients in the control group will receive the same amount of rehabilitation for the recovery of upper limb impairment as the treatment group, which means 3 physiotherapy sessions lasting 1 hour 3 times a week for 4 weeks.

Sponsors & Collaborators

• Sara Ventura

  lead OTHER

Study Design

Allocation

RANDOMIZED

Purpose

TREATMENT

Masking

NONE

Model

PARALLEL

Eligibility

Min Age

18 Years

Max Age

85 Years

Sex

ALL

Healthy Volunteers

No

Timeline & Regulatory

Start

2024-01-08

Primary Completion

2024-12-31

Completion

2025-12-31