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Balance rehabilitation using custom-made Wii Balance Board exercises: Clinical effectiveness and maintenance of gains in acquired brain injury population

Abstract:

Balance disorders are a common impairment after an acquired brain injury (ABI). Neurorehabilitation programs focus on the rehabilitation of balance skills to enhance patients? self-dependency. The Wii Balance Board has been adopted with rehabilitative purposes due to its low cost and widespread battery of exercises. However, this entertainment system is oriented to healthy people and cannot adapt to the patient?s motor (and possible cognitive) deficits. The objective of this study was twofold: a) to study if custom made rehabilitative exercises on a force platform could improve the balance condition of ABI individuals when comparing to conventional physical therapy programs; and b) to study if their clinical effects persisted in absence of the virtual training. To prove the first hypothesis a randomized controlled trial (RCT) was carried out involving 17 ABI participants (control group: eight participants; experimental group: nine participants). To prove the second hypothesis a follow-up study (FUS) was carried out involving seven ABI participants. The participants of both studies underwent 20 one-hour sessions, from three to five sessions per week. The participants were assessed at the beginning and at the end of the treatment (RCT, FUS) and one month after the therapy (FUS). Significant improvement was detected in some scales for those participants who underwent the virtual therapy (RCT). The effects persisted over time (FUS). Balance training through low-cost force platforms and custom made exercises can provide lasting clinical benefits to chronic ABI individuals when compared to conventional treatments.