Digitized Honors Theses (2002-2017)

Date of Award

5-2010

Document Type

Undergraduate Thesis

Degree Name

BA

Department

Psychology

Faculty Mentor

Coral Gubler

Abstract

One of the most common disabilities resulting from stroke is hemiparesis, or weakness on one side of the body, which negatively affects gait. Treadmill training with body weight support (BWS) has been studied as a method of rehabilitation of a normal gait. A BWS system includes a parachute harness to help the patient to stand and walk with balance by reducing the amount of body weight applied to the patient's legs, allowing the patient to begin walking training at an earlier stage after stroke. To determine if treadmill training with BWS is an effective method of gait rehabilitation, a review of seven studies comparing this method to other methods of gait rehabilitation was conducted. From the review, it was found that when using treadmill training with BWS, patients adopted a consistent, symmetrical, and more favorable gait. From the results of the studies, it seems that treadmill training with BWS is either more effective or as equally effective in the rehabilitation of gait after a hemiparetic stroke.

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