Assessment of functional benefits of wearable robotic assistive technologies

• Main Author: Ang, Charleen Pei Yi
• Other Authors: Ang Wei Tech
• Format: Final Year Project
• Language: English
• Published: Nanyang Technological University 2023
• Subjects: Engineering::Mechanical engineering
• Online Access: https://hdl.handle.net/10356/167253
• Institution: Nanyang Technological University

Stroke is one of the most common causes of upper-limb disability and loss of the ability to perform everyday tasks. Stroke rehabilitation is an important part of recovery after stroke to help stroke patients restore their mobility. In Singapore, there are two general pathways for post-stroke care: outpatient rehabilitation and inpatient rehabilitation centres. However, these methods are not as feasible as there is a shortage of trained therapists and stroke patients often have difficulty traveling back and forth to the rehabilitation centre due to their immobility. To overcome these limiting factors, an in-home robotic rehabilitation program can be included as one of the pathways for post-stroke care in Singapore where post-stroke patients participate in therapy in the comfort of their own house without the need for a therapist. Rehabilitation robots can be incorporated with sensors to provide input to the patient in the comfort of their own home. Therefore, this project aims to provide stroke patients with home-based monitoring and assessment without the need for a therapist. To achieve this objective, this project will be evaluating the movement accuracy of the assistive robot arm extender in helping post-stroke patients with their rehabilitation. Inertia Measurement Unit (IMU) sensors are used to estimate the range of motion and upper limb joint angles using direct kinematics and inverse kinematics. The range of motion and upper limb joint angles obtained will then be validated against motion capture which is known as the gold standard for dynamic measurement.