Table 2.

The severity assessment of ischemic stroke patients between retroflex tongue and nonretroflex tongue groups.

Variable	Retroflex tongue		p value
	With (N = 185)	Without (N = 123)
Length of stay (day), mean (SD)	25.9 (14.4)	32.0 (21.5)	0.007∗
NIHSS score¡, mean (SD)	8.9 (5.2)	14.1 (7.8)	<0.001∗
Barthel Index¶, mean (SD)	35.0 (24.2)	18.6 (20.7)	<0.001∗

Student's t-test and Chi-square test or Fisher's exact test; ^∗p < 0.05 has significant statistical differences.

^¡National Institutes of Health Stroke Scale (NIHSS) ranges from 0 to 42 scores; the higher the score means higher neurodamage. The NIHSS has a total of 15 items.

^¶Barthel Index is a common life function scale, ranging from 0 to 100 scores. The lower the score, the higher the life-dependency. Barthel Index has five degrees; scores of 0–20 indicate “total” dependency, 21–60 “severe” dependency, 61–90 “moderate” dependency, 91–99 “slight” dependency, and 100 “total” independency. The cases collected mostly belong to severe dependency.