Development of 6 DOF Upper-Limb Patient Simulator for Hands-On Rehabilitation Education

Abstract

In rehabilitation treatment, the physiotherapy manual diagnostic method is the most affordable to cure spasticity disorders caused by neural impairments. The proficiency of the rehabilitation therapist is critical to maximizing the treatment effect; therefore the therapist’s training focuses on physical hands-on practice. However, realizing a hands-on training to untrained therapists is not readily allowed because the joint’s spasticity in patients is not standardized quantitatively and the unstable supply of spasticity patients with various rigidness for hands-on training. Therefore, the new 6-DOFs upper-limb patient simulator for hands-on rehabilitation education in this study is developed for use in supporting standardized quantitative levels to untrained therapists. Additionally, the new simulator includes a function of manual diagnosis to embody various spastic rigidity of patients’ joint. For the verification of the proposed system, both trained and untrained therapists evaluate how well the joints’ spasticity of the developed robotic simulator and human patients are similar. Consequently, the developed robotic simulator is validated to be effective for rehabilitation therapy education.