In chronic stroke patients, 3 months of PRB exercises and motivational discussions induced improvements in balance at 3 months and in walking speed at 3 and 6 months. Implications for Rehabilitation A progressive resistance and balance exercise program supported by motivational group discussions and one home-based exercise appears to be an effective means of improving the short-term balance and the walking speed in individuals with chronic stroke. People with poor balance and motor function discontinued the study more often and may require additional support. There is a need for powerful and cost-effective strategies that target changes in behavior to obtain long-term changes in physical function after exercising.

The increased risk of falls in patients with chronic obstructive pulmonary disease warrants attention in order to reduce serious and adverse health consequences of falls.

Objective: To evaluate whetherdaily mobile-phone delivered messages with training instructions during three months increase physical activity and overall mobility in patients soon after stroke or transient ischemic attack. Design: Randomised controlled trial with intention-to-treat analyses. Setting: University hospital. Data collection from November 2016 until December2018. Subjects: Seventy-nine patients (mean (SD) age 63.9 (10.4) years, 29 were women) were allocated to either intervention ( n = 40) or control group ( n = 39). Participants had to be independent (modified Ranking Scale ⩽2) and able to perform the six-minute walking test at discharge from the hospital. Interventions: The intervention group received standard care and daily mobile phone instructional text messages to perform regular outdoor walking and functional leg exercises. The control group received standard care; that is, primary care follow-up. Main measures: Walking performance by six-minute walking test (m), lower body strength by five times chair-stand test (s), the short physical performance battery (0–12 points) and 10-metres walk test (m/s) were assessed at baseline and after three months. Results: The estimated median difference in the six-minute walking test was in favour of the intervention group by 30 metres (95% CI, 55 to 1; effect size 0.64; P = 0.037) and in the chair-stand test by 0.88 seconds (95% CI, 0.02 to 1.72; effect size 0.64; P = 0.034). There were no differences between groups on the short physical performance battery or in 10-metres walking time. Conclusions: Three months of daily mobile phone text messages with guided training instructions improved composite mobility measures; that is, walking performanceand lower body strength. Clinical Trial Registry: The study is registered with ClinicalTrials.gov , number NCT02902367.

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Background Dizziness is common among patients with first time stroke. It affects self-perceived health and is a risk factor for falls. Vestibular rehabilitation (VR) is effective for treating dizziness among various conditions, but the effect of dizziness with origin in the central nervous system is poorly studied. This pilot study of a randomized controlled trial aimed at investigating a vestibular rehabilitation programme among patients with first time stroke and concomitant dizziness. A second aim was to study the feasibility of performing the randomized controlled trial. Methods The participants were computer generated randomized to either an intervention or a control group. The intervention comprised of four different vestibular rehabilitation exercises, adapted for each patient and usual rehabilitation. The control group received usual rehabilitation without the vestibular rehabilitation exercises. Outcome measures used were The Activities-specific Balance Confidence Scale, the Berg Balance Scale, the Functional Gait Assessment Scale and the EuroQol-5D. Feasibility was studied in terms of recruitment, adherence and retention rates, also as the ability to collect primary and secondary outcomes as well as to find indications of treatment differences. Results Self-rated health improved for all participants. No other differences between baseline and follow-up were detected neither within nor between groups. Recruitment rate was 23%, adherence to the intervention 90%, retention rate 69% and ability to collect outcome measures 90%. No adverse events occurred. Conclusion Both the intervention and the control groups improved in self-perceived health. The measures of feasibility were satisfactory in this study, apart from a low recruitment rate.