Abstract

Fall and injury rates in people with stroke (PwS) are substantially larger than in their healthy peers. Yet, where many RCTs have shown reduced fall rates following exercise therapy in community-dwelling elderly, similar evidence for the efficacy of such interventions in PwS has been lacking. The recently updated Cochrane review on interventions for preventing falls in PwS now provides evidence that exercise therapy does work in PwS, but also leaves many questions unanswered. In this talk, Dr. Weerdesteyn will discuss the results of the updated Cochrane review, and will present new results that provide insight into some of the open questions regarding which PwS may be eligible for falls prevention and regarding specific types of intervention.

Biography

Dr. Vivian Weerdesteyn is an associate professor in the department of Rehabilitation at Radboud University in the Netherlands. In her research, she aims to elucidate the pathophysiological mechanisms underlying impaired balance and gait control in people with neurological conditions, and to design and evaluate novel interventions to ameliorate these problems.