Journal of Rehabil itation Research & Development Task-oriented treadmill exercise training in chronic hemiparetic stroke

Abstract—Patients with stroke have elevated hemiparetic gait costs secondary to low activity levels and are often severely deconditioned. Decrements in peak aerobic capacity affect functional ability and cardiovascular-metabolic health and may be partially mediated by molecular changes in hemiparetic skeletal muscle. Conventional rehabilitation is time delimited in the subacute stroke phase and does not provide adequate aero-bic intensity to reverse the profound detriments to fitness and function that result from stroke. Hence, we have studied pro-gressive full body weight-support treadmill (TM) training as an adjunct therapy in the chronic stroke phase. Task-oriented TM training has produced measurable changes in fitness, function, and indices of cardiovascular-metabolic health after stroke, but the precise mechanisms for these changes remain under investi-gation. Further, the optimal dose of this therapy has yet to b