Gait disturbance is one of the major complications in stroke patients and limits the patient's activities of daily living. An inability or an impaired ability to walk is a significant contributor to long-term disability and burden of care after stroke, and improved walking function is an important factor in returning to social life [
1]. Because standing and walking balance are important predictors of the safe performance of gait and other functional activities, an extensive range of programs has been employed to improve standing and walking balance of hemiplegic patients. These include muscle-strengthening exercises, gait exercises, balance exercises, aerobic exercises, patient education and physical therapy [
2]. Assistive robotic devices are a newly introduced rehabilitative approach for gait disturbance, and they have received considerable attention as a changing paradigm from classical rehabilitative training [
3]. The potentially positive benefit of robotic gait training is that it involves repeatedly undergoing sufficient and accurate training for a prolonged period without laborious intervention of physical therapists. Lokomat (Hocoma AG, Zurich, Switzerland) is the first robotic-driven gait orthosis with electromechanical drives to assist the walking movements of gait-impaired patients on a treadmill by supporting the body weight [
4,
5]. Like Lokomat, a conventionally developed, gait assistive, exoskeletal robot is huge in size and utilized only with treadmill walking with a suspension system [
3]. One disadvantage of treadmill training using Lokomat or similar devices is the effort needed by therapists to move patients on or off the treadmill, set the paretic limbs, and apply the suspension system [
6]. In addition, the fixed speed of the treadmill can limit the therapy intensity. These factors make the exoskeletons less portable and less practical, especially for paralyzed patients. The cost of the device is another important issue. Most exoskeleton systems currently available may be priced as high as US $100,000 or more, which is not cost-effective, and only affordable to a small number of people [
7]. To solve the above mentioned problems and to assist the gait of patients with hemiplegia, we have developed a wearable and portable, light weight, gait assistive robot named WA-H (‘walking assist for hemiplegia’) that can be adapted directly for use at home and rehabilitation centers [
8]. Compared to other gait assistive robots, such as Lokomat, presently used in the medical field, this light weight, gait assistive, robot system can be used without a treadmill, is portable for outdoor activities, and can be implemented at a relatively lower cost than integrated systems. Therefore it can provide gait training in various environments such as home and/or outdoors, depending on the condition of the patient. This study aims to investigate the clinical feasibility of the portable, wearable gait assistive robot, WA-H, on the balance function of patients with stroke-induced hemiplegia. This is a second study following up on a pilot study conducted in 2013 with 2 stroke patients to confirm the device stability [
9]. Accordingly, this study is designed to confirm further the efficacy of the device with a greater number of patients. The main hypothesis is that gait training with a newly developed, portable, gait assistive robot would be superior to previous devices with respect to the restoration of gait ability and balance. The clinical efficacy of the newly developed, gait assistive robot for improving the gait ability and balance function of stroke patients undergoing rehabilitation was evaluated.