Recovery after stroke

Functional recovery at 6 months post stroke appears to be largely defined within the first 72 hours after stroke onset. In addition, most of the time dependent dynamic changes in recovery plateau within 8-12 weeks after stroke onset. The majority of patients show a fixed proportional change of about 70% of their initial baseline level. However, 30% of patients with an initial poor prognosis are identified improperly. Therefore, prediction models of functional outcome post stroke need further improvement. Moreover, prediction rules need to be verified in those patients that were excluded from above-mentioned longitudinal studies due to co-morbidity, repetitive strokes and/or hemorrhagic strokes. These prediction rules should be able to handle the large variety in stroke patients that is currently encountered in our stroke units. Answering aforementioned questions requires uniform, repeated and time-fixed assessment of determinants and measures of functional outcome after stroke. Additional neurophysiological assessment may be needed to improve prognostic models.

Clinical assessments are repeated at week 1, 3, 5, 8, 12, and 26. The accelerometry-based ambulatory monitoring measurements are performed in week 3, 12, and 26. The EEG measurements are performed in week 1, 5, 8, and 12.

Not applicable, all subjects will receive usual rehabilitation care independently from each other and from the researchers according to prevailing guidelines.