Abstract
Stroke survivors might lose their walking and balancing abilities, but many studies pointed out that cycling is an effective means for lower limb rehabilitation. However, during cycle training, the unaffected limb tends to compensate for the affected one, which resulted in suboptimal rehabilitation. To address this issue, we present a Virtual Reality-Cycling Training System (VRCTS), which senses the cycling force and speed in real-time, analyzes the acquired data to produce feedback to patients with a controllable VR car in a VR rehabilitation program, and thus specifically trains the affected side. The aim of the study was to verify the functionality of the VRCTS and to verify the results from the ten stroke patients participants and to compare the result of Asymmetry Ratio Index (ARI) between the experimental group and the control group, after their training, by using the bilateral pedal force and force plate to determine any training effect. The results showed that after the VRCTS training in bilateral pedal force it had improved by 0.22 (p = 0.046) and in force plate the stand balance has also improved by 0.29 (p = 0.031); thus both methods show the significant difference.
Highlights
Advancements in medical technology have improved the survival rate of stroke patients
We presented a Virtual Reality (VR)-Cycling Training System (VRCTS), which consisted of a VR rehabilitation program and the cycling
The results showed that, after the calibration of the pretest, users could control the direction and the speed of the VR car, which demonstrated that the system might work on stroke patients
Summary
Advancements in medical technology have improved the survival rate of stroke patients. One of the most important objectives of stroke rehabilitation is to restore a participant’s walking ability [4,5,6,7] Walking for these patients, many times, requires a significant increase in strength and coordination. The pattern of cycling is very similar to walking [13,14,15,16] because both cycling and walking are cyclical and required reciprocal flexing and extension movements from the hip, the knee, and the ankle These exercises could alternatively activate agonist and antagonist muscles with regular intervals of activity and coordination [17,18,19], which mitigated the balancing problem and provided a safer means for rehabilitation. Cycling exercise has great potential in preambulation training methods, commencing as soon as the patient has the ability to sit
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