Rehabilitation of stroke patients with apraxia: the role of additional cognitive and motor impairments.

Purpose : The present study investigated which additional cognitive and motor impairments were present in stroke patients with apraxia and which of these factors influenced the effects of treatment. Method : A group of 33 patients with apraxia were treated according to the guidelines of a therapy programme based on teaching patients strategies to compensate for the presence of apraxia. Patients were treated at occupational therapy departments in general hospitals, rehabilitation centres and nursing homes. The outcome of the strategy training was studied in a pre-post test design; measurements were conducted at baseline and after 12 weeks of therapy. The pretreatment scores of the patients with apraxia were compared to normscores and scores of a control group of patients without apraxia ( n = 36) to investigate which impairments are present. The following variables were analysed in order to determine which factors influence outcome: additional neuropsychological deficits (comprehension of language, cogniti...