Design and Fabrication of Rehabilitation Instrument for Upper and Lower Limb

Abstract

Abstract: In today’s world, most of the people have a busy and hectic schedule. They hardly get time to look after their physical health which then affects them in their elderly age or in some cases at a young age. To take care of such physical problems rehabilitation is necessary. Rehabilitation improves and returns functional capacity and quality lifespan of people with physical injuries or disorders. Rehabilitation is not only used for treatment of physical diseases but also in sports industry. It helps in fast recovery of athletes and increases their performance on the field. Our project proposes a design of a rehabilitation instrument for upper and lower limbs. The upper limb rehabilitation instrument is designed for our shoulders and arm. It is designed to provide natural shoulder and arm movements in all directions possible. The lower limb rehabilitation instrument focuses mostly on knee and ankle joints and the EMS (Electro –Muscle Stimulator) is used to send external electric signals to the inactive muscles (muscles which have lost contact with the brain). The external electric signals sent are similar to the signals sent by brain to muscles. These signals help in contraction and expansion of muscles and thus, help in movement of that part of the body. The Rehabilitation instrument we are developing would be user-friendly, compact and budget friendly. Index Terms: Rehabilitation, Upper limb, Lower limb, Shoulder flexion, Shoulder extension, elbow inward rotation, elbow outward rotation, Paralysis, Physiotherapy.