Standardisation in acute stroke research: A scoping review of upper limb assessments against Stroke Recovery and Rehabilitation Roundtable (SRRR) benchmarks

TL;DR

This study reviews how well acute stroke research on upper limb assessments follows SRRR guidelines, finding gaps in standardization and comprehensive methods.

Contribution

The paper provides a scoping review of acute stroke upper limb assessments against SRRR benchmarks, highlighting current gaps and suggesting improvements.

Findings

Global and impairment-level assessments are widely used, but activity-level tools are underrepresented.

Structural brain imaging is common but often used only diagnostically, while functional imaging is rare.

Demographic reporting is inconsistent, with underrepresentation of young adults and women.

Abstract

To examine how well acute stroke studies assessing upper limb sensorimotor capacity align with the Stroke Recovery and Rehabilitation Roundtable (SRRR) recommendations, focussing on the type of assessment tools used, study and participant characteristics, follow-up timings, and the use of clinical and multimodal data.

Scoping review.

Embase, MEDLINE, PubMed, CINAHL, PsycINFO, Google Scholar, and Web of Science were searched for relevant studies published between 01 August 2017 and 30 September 2025.

This review included studies involving adults with stroke who underwent upper limb assessment during the acute phase. Data were extracted on clinical, structural, and functional assessments, as well as follow-up timing, study, and participant characteristics. Of the 3628 identified articles, 132 met the inclusion criteria.

While global assessments (e.g. NIH stroke scale [NIHSS]) and impairment-level upper limb assessments (e.g. Upper-extremity Fugl-Meyer Assessment) were widely used, activity-level tools (e.g. Action Research Arm Test) were underrepresented. Structural brain imaging was common, though often used only diagnostically, while functional brain imaging and multimodal approaches were rare. Follow-up timing varied, with limited long-term tracking. Demographic reporting was inconsistent, with underrepresentation of young adults and women.

Despite progress, significant gaps remain in the standardisation and comprehensiveness of upper limb assessment in acute stroke research. Future studies should better align with SRRR recommendations to improve data comparability and scientific rigour.

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