Robot-assisted remote rehabilitation

Abstract

Rehabilitation is the therapy that used to help people with disorders to restore or improve the functions of lost or diminished parts. Robots are popularly used in rehabilitation since the early sixties of the last century. The medical therapy for extremities can be divided into two main categories: upper and lower limb rehabilitation devices. The major difference between these two categories is in the magnitude of the applied force. The main purpose of incorporating robots in the rehabilitation process is compensating lost functions in physically disabled individuals. This article proposes a robotic system entirely dedicated to remote elbow rehabilitation. The idea is to provide a rehabilitation system controlled by a remote physiotherapist. The solution combines the technique of gesture control and the concept of the Internet of Things to offer gestural control via the Internet of a rehabilitation robot. The electromechanical system designed is lightweight and portable, making it a suitable solution for home use. Labview-based software is developed to provide a user-friendly interface that allows the physiotherapist to control the device from a distance. The Kinect camera-based system detects the physiotherapist’s action and transmits it to the software for processing and sending to the robot. JKI HTTP REST Client has been used to develop a web client interacting with servers. The HTTP client library is used to ensure the connection of LabVIEW-based applications with RESTful web services. The proposed method is verified and validated experimentally. The obtained experimental results show the effectiveness of the developed remote rehabilitation system.