Robotics for Rehabilitation

This one line in here really chaps my ass. That new president of that great stroke association needs to read these people the riot act. THE ONLY GOAL IN STROKE IS 100% RECOVERY

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The goal of post strokes neurorehabilitation programs remains in reducing of the grade of permanent disability.

Robotics for Rehabilitation

  Adriana Vilaça A72355; Cláudia Oliveira A73605; Mariana Pires A71536

 ABSTRACT

 The objectives for this project are to discuss and analyze the importance of the use of robotics in rehabilitation, two applications and potential future.
Keywords: Rehabilitation, Robotics, Lokomat, Mit-Manus
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INTRODUCTION
 The Lower limb or Upper limb disabilities, that we will discuss on this paper, usually result from neurological injuries, such as strokes and spinal cord injuries.1

Therefore, in literature stroke it’s seen as leading cause of disability, despite continued advances in prevention and treatment techniques. The stroke generate lesion to the nervous system that disrupts the normal motor commands for limb movement. Developed medical treatment to reduce the complications has contributed to decreased mortality, but 90% of the survivors have significant neurological deficits. The goal of post strokes neurorehabilitation programs remains in reducing of the grade of permanent disability. As in the development of any other field, some ideas and inventions have worked and been expanded upon, therefore a number of laboratories using robotic devices, have indicated modest success in reducing impairment and increasing motor power in the exercised limb of patients with stroke when compared with control individuals.6
 During this research the focus stands with two robots used in rehabilitation, as MIT-Manus and LOKOMAT. Some of the designs of this robotics have been created to enhance the performance of the human body while others were created for medical treatments to improve daily life of people who have been affected by a degenerative disease or traumatic injury.7
 Traditionally a robotic system embraces five main components: a mechanical structure with degrees of freedom;  joint-controlling actuators, either electric, pneumatic or hydraulic for loads in the range of thousands of Newtons; designated ambient, the space within reach of the robotic devices; sequences of tasks to be executed as detailed by the system computer in suitable language and a computer generating the signals that control the robot joints consistent, actual and previous operative conditions and environment.3
 In particularly, the electromechanical systems result from the evolution of robotics. This system has highly flexibility mechanic structures. Therefore, is arranged on them actuators; the source of energy; sensors providing information on the machine functional status and interaction with environment; a computer single chips processing the signals transmitted by the sensors and instructing the motor controllers; a machine interface that collect information/instructions from users and providing online feedback.3

The patient’s subjective control of voluntary movements, somatosensory inputs, proprioceptive static and dynamic information, pertinent visual information, motivation, perception of achievement and reward, are some of the characteristics, that is essential for the development of the robots, which differ with a variety of sensory, motor and cognitive inputs.