Intramuscular Electrical Stimulation for Shoulder Pain in Hemiplegia: Does Time From Stroke Onset Predict Treatment Success?:

Background. A randomized clinical has shown the effectiveness of intramuscular electrical stimulation for the treatment of poststroke shoulder pain. Objective. Identify predictors of treatment success and assess the impact of the strongest predictor on outcomes. Method. This is a secondary analysis of a multisite randomized clinical trial of intramuscular electrical stimulation for poststroke shoulder pain. The study included 61 chronic stroke survivors with shoulder pain randomized to a 6-week course of intramuscular electrical stimulation (n = 32) versus a hemisling (n = 29). The primary outcome measure was Brief Pain Inventory Question 12. Treatment success was defined as ≥ 2-point reduction in this measure at end of treatment and at 3, 6, and 12 months posttreatment. Forward stepwise regression was used to identify factors predictive of treatment success among participants assigned to the electrical stimulation group. The factor most predictive of treatment success was used as an explanatory variable,...