Effects of the Abdominal Drawing-in Maneuver and the Abdominal Expansion Maneuver on Grip Strength, Balance and Pulmonary Function in Stroke Patients

Purpose: The purpose was to determine whether the application of the abdominal drawing-in maneuver (ADIM) and abdominal expansion maneuver (AEM) to stroke patients would affects their trunk stability, balance, pulmonary function, and grip strength.Methods: The subjects were 36 stroke patients who were randomly and equally assigned to an ADIM group (n = 12), an AEM group (n= 12), and a control group (n= 12).The intervention was applied to each group three times per week, 30 minutes each time, for four weeks.Outcome measures were grip strength, modified functional reach test (mFRT) and pulmonary function.Pulmonary function were measured force expiratory volume at one second (FEV1), forced vital capacity (FVC), FEV1/FVC and peak expiratory flow (PEF) values.Results: The results of the three groups showed statistically significant improvements in grip strength.The AEM group showed significantly greater differences in grip strength than either the ADIM group or the control group.In the anterior mFRT, the ADIM group showed significantly improvements than the control group.The ADIM and AEM groups were showed statistically significant greater improvements in PEF between the baseline and post-intervention and the post-analysis revealed that the AEM group showed significantly greater improvements than the control group. Conclusion:The results of this study indicate that the ADIM and AEM were effective in improving the PEF of pulmonary function.The ADIM was more effective than AEM in trunk stabilization.