Prediction of social activity 1 year poststroke

Objective: To develop an easy-to-use prediction rule for social activity I year poststroke that can identify patients at risk for social inactivity.

Design: Inception cohort.

Setting: Rehabilitation center.

Participants: Patients with a first-ever supratentorial stroke were selected in 4 Dutch rehabilitation centers. Data of 250 patients were available for analysis. Potential prognostic factors measured at admission were sex, age, marital status, prestroke employment status, educational level, type of stroke, hemisphere, motor impairment, trunk control, communication, and activities of daily living (ADL) dependency.

Interventions: Not applicable.

Main Outcome Measure: Social activity measured by the Frenchay Activities Index (FAT) at I year poststroke.

Results: Multivariate backward linear regression analysis identified sex, age, marital status, motor impairment, communication, and ADL dependency as important predictors of the FAI score I year poststroke. An easy-to-use score chart was constructed that could identify patients at risk for social inactivity. The score chart proved to be well able to discriminate poor social functioning from moderate to good social functioning (area under the curve=.85).

Conclusions: Identifying patients at risk enables health care professionals to focus on the social activity of this patient subgroup at an early stage in the care process. Key Words: Cerebrovascular accident; Prognosis; Rehabilitation; Outcome assessment, health care.