- Researchers from Sweden were interested in learning about the importance of physical activity in the first 6 months following a person having a stroke.
- Strokes, the fifth
leading cause of death in the United States, occur when a blood clot bursts or a vein ruptures in the brain. - The new study’s authors learned that increasing activity levels improved the chances of study participants having a better functional outcome following a stroke.
Strokes impact hundreds of thousands of people every year, and they can range from causing mild damage to death.
In non-lethal strokes, some issues people face may include loss of functioning in one side of the body, difficulty speaking, and motor skill deficits.
Functional outcome following a stroke is the basis for a new study published in
The study authors used data from the
The authors were interested in participants who signed up for the study 2-15 days after having a stroke and who also followed up over a period of six months.
Participants had to have their physical activity assessed at one week, one month, three months, and six months for study inclusion.
Overall, 1,367 participants qualified for the study, with 844 male participants and 523 female participants. The participants’ ages ranged from 65 to 79 years, with a median age of 72 years.
During the follow-ups, doctors assessed the participants’ physical activity levels. Using the Saltin-Grimby Physical Activity Level Scale, their activity was marked at one of four levels:
- inactivity
- light-intensity physical activity for at least 4 hours per week
- moderate-intensity physical activity for at least 3 hours per…
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