Robot-Aided Neurorehabilitation: A Novel Robot for Ankle Rehabilitation

Written in 2009. What happened to it?  I'm not looking for it, none of this is my job. It is your doctor's job which I assume they are failing at since they don't know what happened to it either. 

On second reading this is totally useless, it is only a measurement tool.

This should already be in the public database of all stroke research and protocols that doesn't exist because we have fucking failures of stroke associations.  Precisely why they need to destroyed and recreated and run by survivors.

Robot-Aided Neurorehabilitation: A Novel Robot for Ankle Rehabilitation

 Manuscript received August 6, 2008; revised February 15, 2009. This paper was recommended for publication by Associate Editor E. Guglieilmelli and Editor K. Lynch upon evaluation of the reviewers’ comments. This work was supported in part by the Department of Veterans Affairs Rehabilitation Research and Development Service under Grant B2294T and in part by Baltimore Veterans Affairs Medical Center “Center of Excellence on Task-Oriented Exercise and Robotics in Neurological Diseases” under Grant B3688R.
  Anindo Roy
 , Member, IEEE
, Hermano Igo Krebs
 , Senior Member, IEEE
, Dustin J. Williams, Christopher T. Bever,Larry W. Forrester, Richard M. Macko, and Neville Hogan

Abstract

—In this paper, we present the design and characterization of a novel ankle robot developed at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT). This robotic module is being tested with stroke patients at Baltimore Veterans Administration Medical Center. The purpose of the on-going study is to train stroke survivors to overcome common foot drop and balance problems in order to improve their ambulatory performance. Its design follows the same guidelines of our upper extremity designs, i.e., itis a low friction, back driveable device with intrinsically low mechanical impedance. Here, we report on the design and mechanical characteristics of the robot. We also present data to demonstrate the potential of this device as an efficient clinical measurement tool to estimate intrinsic ankle properties. Given the importance of the ankle during locomotion, an accurate estimate of ankle stiffness would be a valuable asset for locomotor rehabilitation. Our initial ankle stiffness estimates compare favorably with previously published work, indicating that our method may serve as an accurate clinical measurement tool.