Development of a Virtual Reality Environment for Rehabilitation of Tetraplegics

Abstract

Treatments based on Virtual Reality have been successfully used in motor rehabilitation of issues such as Spinal Cord Injury and Stroke. Highly immersive Virtual environments combined with biofeedback can be utilized to train functional activities on patients with these motor disabilities. This work details the development of a portable Virtual Reality environment to train upper limbs activities on Spinal Cord Injury subjects. The Virtual Reality environment depicts a personalized physiotherapy room where the user trains elbow and shoulder by reaching 5 spots on table. Also the user have a biofeedback of both hands’ position. Finally this system will be integrated a pilot biomechanical analysis using The Motion Monitor system to compare a group of patients before and after a 6 week intervention with Virtual Reality.