Preliminary Exploration of Haptic-enabled Therapist-in-the-Loop Telerehabilitation System for Exoskeleton-assisted Upper Limb Training

• Published in: International Conference on Industrial Mechatronics and Automation (Online) pp. 1984 - 1989
• Main Authors: Li, He, Guo, Shuxiang, Wang, Hanze, Bu, Dongdong
• Format: Conference Proceeding
• Language: English
• Published: IEEE 06.08.2023
• Subjects: Delay effects; exoskeleton robot; Exoskeletons; Force; haptic feedback; master-slave system; Real-time systems; Stroke (medical condition); therapist-in-the-loop; Training; Upper limb telerehabilitation; Virtual reality
• ISSN: 2152-744X
• DOI: 10.1109/ICMA57826.2023.10216246

Faced with the increase in upper limb hemiplegia caused by stroke, robotic exoskeleton-assisted home-based telerehabilitation has attracted increasing attention in recent years. Telerehabilitation is a viable alternative to traditional face-to-face rehabilitation training, which has many advantages. In this paper, a preliminary therapist-in-the-loop haptic-enable telerehabilitation system for upper limb training is presented. In the telerehabilitation system, a high-definition haptic device manipulated by the operator (served as the therapist) is the master side, and the designed upper limb rehabilitation exoskeleton worn by the subject (served as the stroke patient) is the slave side. The master-slave side realizes the operation and force data transmission through TCP/IP communication protocol. Through experiments, the angle error and time delay are analyzed, which proves the usability of the constructed system and lays the foundation for the subsequent research.