Comparison of Fine Motor Skills in Patients With Chronic Stroke in Final Stages of Bronestrum and Healthy Adults

One of the main problems of chronic stroke patients is the inability to move the fingers separately despite the passing of an extended period of time since the onset of the disease. Dexterity is a fine motor skill that allows one to manipulate objects through voluntary movement. The aim of this study was to compare the fine motor skills of patients with chronic stroke to those of healthy controls. This analytic and descriptive cross-sectional study was carried out randomly on 50 patients with chronic stroke with a mean age of 57.8 years suffering for 46 - 72 months and on 50 healthy people with a mean age of 51.16 years. Patients did not receive any intervention before or after one week of assessment. The function of both hands of each patient was measured with the nine-holepegtest (NHPT) and the box and block test (BBT). The results showed that the mean variation of speed in the BBT test (standard deviation [SD]) in the left hands of the patients (recessive limb) was 57.8 (12.75), greater than in their right hand (dominant limb) (54.76 [8.67]). The rate of speed in healthy people’s right hands was 68.58 (8.31), greater than in their left hands (63.5 [8.54]). In addition, the results of the NHPT showed that the stroke patients needed more time to manipulate the objects than the healthy ones. For the NHPT, the mean (SD) of the right hand (dominant limb) patients (4.89) and healthy controls 36.7 (14.5) 21.98, mean (SD) of the left hand (dominant limb) patients (4.45) and 30.4 in healthy subjects (4.09) 24.18 respectively. Independent T-test showed P < 0.05 in all the results obtained, respectively. The results showed that the dexterity fingers of patients suffering from stroke at the final stages of Bronestrum is much closer to the dexterity of healthy controls.