Abstract: Objective To evaluate the effectiveness of robot-assisted training on lower extremities of patients with stroke. Methods PubMed, Medline, EMbase, Cochrane Central Register of Controlled Trials (CENTRAL), ISI Web of Knowledge, Ovid, China National Knowledge Infrastructure (CNKI), Wanfang Data and VIP Database for Chinese Technical Periodicals were searched for the randomized controlled trials (RCTs) about robot-assisted training for lower extremities of patients with stroke from the date of establishment to March 2013. The bibliographies of the retrieved studies were also searched. 2 independent researchers evaluated the included studies using the risk of bias provided by Cochrane Library. The extracted data were analyzed by RevMan 5.1 software. Results A total of 12 trials were discovered.Compared with conventional training, the robot-assisted training increased the score of Fugl-Meyer assessment (lower extremity)(WED=3.97, 95%CI: 2.84~5.10, Z=6.89, P<0.00001) and Berg Balance Scale (WED=3.13, 95%CI: 0.80~5.45, Z=2.63, P=0.008). However,the results of stride frequency (WED=8.40, 95%CI: -0.95~17.75, Z=1.76, P=0.08) and speed (WED=0.03, 95%CI: -0.02~0.07, Z=1.18, P=0.24) were not statistically significant. According to the Jadad Score of included studies, 4 of them were of low quality and 8 of them were of high quality. Conclusion The current evidence shows that to some extent, robot-assisted training could improve the lower extremities function.

Key words: robot-assisted training, stroke, lower extremities, systematic review, randomized controlled trial