The Influence of the Symptoms of Visual-neglect on ADL Progress
This longitudinal study of CVA patients has two parts: the first with 50 subjects and the second with 24 subjects. The first part of study shows that in making a prognosis of the early stage of CVA, the factor of visual neglect is most critical.
The second part suggested that I-ADL is a better criteria than ADL for long-term CVA patients.
1) In the first study, the 50 subjects, hospitalized in the Department of Rehabilitation Medicine, Korea University Hospital from January 1998 to December 1999, were divided by the result of their MVPT (Motor Free Visual Perception Test) into two groups: one with visual neglect and the other with no visual neglect. In terms of ADL (Activities of Daily Living), the group with visual neglect significantly scored less that the group with no visual neglect. This result strongly supports the hypothesis that the factor of visual neglect is closely related with the CVA patients’ progress of ADL.
2) After two years, the follow-up study on remaining 24 clients (4 deceased, 22 unreachable) has been conducted in an attempt to identify any significant differences of the progress of ADL and I-ADL (Instrumental Activities of Daily Living) between two groups: neglect and neglect-free group. At this time, the ADL of both groups have remarkably improved with no significant difference
between groups. However, both groups still scored significantly low in I-ADL.
3) These results lead us to the conclusion that only in the early rehabilitation period, the factor of visual neglect is very useful to predict a prognosis of the CVA patients. In addition, it is reasonable to suppose that rehabilitation for the chronic CVA patients should be guided by I-ADL rather than ADL.