Characterising upper extremity kinematics in adults with hemiplegia after stroke.

Upper extremity kinematics are important for understanding functional ability and performance improvements for adults in stroke rehabilitation. The Box and Block Test (BBT) is a clinical tool used to measure hand dexterity, which is often used for tracking the effectiveness of therapy, particularly in clinical trials of stroke rehabilitation interventions. BBT measure the number of blocks moved in one minute (determining the rate of upper extremity movement) however the compensatory strategies cannot be assessed. The purpose of this study is to explore differences in BBT scores, and upper extremity kinematics based on therapy treatment/s in adults with stroke who were participating in a clinical trial. Therefore, two groups will be evaluated (those who received motor training and those who did not, i.e. control). In our dataset, participants have completed the BBT while kinematic measures (hand velocity and position and shoulder, elbow, and wrist range of motion and peak joint angles) were captured using standard three-dimensional motion capture techniques. Our aim is to determine the correlation between upper extremity kinematics and the BBT score (as measured as the rate of block movement during the BBT). We hypothesise that BBT scores and joint kinematics will be significantly different between treatment groups and we also hypothesise a positive correlation between BBT rate and shoulder, elbow, wrist joint angles, hand velocity, and path length.