Prozac may help stroke victims recover by helping to improve movement and coordination.

That’s the latest word from Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine researchers who found, in studies of mice, that the antidepressant (also known as fluoxetine) prolongs the time after a stroke during which physical therapy remains effective for recovering lost motor function.

"For rehabilitation to be effective, it needs to start as soon after a stroke as possible," said Steven Zeiler, M.D., assistant professor of neurology at Johns Hopkins and lead author of the new study, published in the journal Stroke. "But with this study, we've shown that in mice, we can extend the time period during which rehabilitative intervention has an effect on meaningful recovery."

About 65 percent of stroke survivors experience some weakness or paralysis of their limbs, and difficulty in walking and moving due to the death of brain cells.

Rehabilitation involves retraining other parts of the brain to take over and restore lost functions. The new study found mice with induced strokes given fluoxetine recovered the ability to perform learned tasks even if they started rehab after a week's delay.

Dr. Zeiler said that the precise cause of fluoxetine's effect on stroke recovery is not yet known, but he believes it changes the way the animals’ brains responded to retraining.

"We believe the drug is changing plasticity," said Dr. Zeiler, "changing the way individual neurons are responding to sensory input after the stroke."