Hinckley (2002) noted that 62 % of chronic aphasia patients from an intensive treatment program were in employment 2 years after discharge. Aphasia rehabilitation may also promote community reintegration, workplace flexibility, and enhancement of social support to the patients that further enables the person with aphasia to return to a former job. The current study confirmed that job type remained significantly related to the chance of employment after 18 months from onset as well as to very early return to work, which was consistent with findings in previous studies in Japan and in other countries (Saeki et al. 1993; Howard et al. 1985; Hannerz et al. 2011; Vestling et al. 2003). Some studies

reported selleck products that age was not related to very early return to work, but our study

found that younger age was significantly associated with a return to employment within 18 months. Previous rehabilitation PF01367338 studies suggested that there were no differences in the chance of recovery from walking disability, attention dysfunction, and aphasia according to age, and they recommended intensive rehabilitation regardless of patient age (Pickersgill and Lincoln 1983; Luk et al. 2006; Denti et al. 2008). However, several studies, including this study, revealed that older age was related to a lower probability of returning to work in the chronic stage (Howard et al. 1985; Hannerz et al. 2011; Saeki 2000, Busch et al. 2009; Wozniak et al. 1999). We speculate that social as well as physiological conditions may play a role in employment rehabilitation of older patients who face restrictive social conditions for labor participation. Investigation of social aspects of rehabilitation into the

working environment is warranted to further facilitate return to work of stroke patients irrespective of age. In our analysis, the BI and walking ability in the early phase were related to return to work within 18 months. In our previous study on early return to work (Tanaka et al. 2011), we used the over mRS at discharge as a predictor of return to work. Since walking and functional abilities reflected in BI are influential factors determining the level of the mRS, the results confirmed that functional and walking disability similarly affected the chance of return to work in very early as well as in the chronic phase. We could not use the factors of family wish for patient return to work, collaboration with industrial physicians, cooperation of workplace supervisors, coordination of the work environment, provision of vocational rehabilitation, and support of medical institutions on return to work as independent variables in the multivariate analysis because of the large see more number of missing observation. The impact of support from patient’s family and former work place on return to work deserves further investigation in future research. This study had several limitations.