Effect of newly developed balance training system in patients with stroke

The purpose of this study was to evaluate the effect of newly developed balance training system (I balance S®) in chronic hemiplegic patients. Thirty chronic (more than 6 months) hemiplegic patients who were capable of standing without assistive devices participated in this study. The study started with pre-evaluation such as Berg balance test (BBT), 10 m walking test (lOmWT) and Functional reach test (FRT). After pre-evaluations, balance training was applied for 4 weeks. And then, three phases of post-evaluation were performed, just after (post 1), 1 week (post 2), and 4 weeks (post 3) after treatment. All subjects showed a significant improvement in BBT (52. 19±3. 87 (pre), 53. 12±3. 14 (post 1), 53. 3812. 99 (post 2), 53. 65±2. 90 (post 3)), 10m WT (9. 93±2. 36 sec, 9. 56±2. 53 sec, 9. 3012. 25 sec, 9. 16±2. 62 sec, respectively) and FRT (19. 33±4. 99 cm, 21. 55±4. 57 cm, 21. 9814. 69 cm, 21. 8314. 84 cm, respectively) after training compared to the status before training. The hemiplegic patients trained by I balance S® showed a significant improvement in BBT, 10mWT and FRT after training. In addition, this effect lasted for 4 weeks. Therefore, newly developed balance training system (I balance S®) is considered to be a useful tool for balance training of chronic hemiplegic patients.