While the presence and demand of robotic rehabilitation devices are rising, not many studies have been performed on haptic communication/ telerehabilitation with these devices. Despite therapists' desire to have the possibility to remain in the loop when their patients are performing exercises. This study aims to provide a telerehabilitation system that accommodates therapist-patient interaction during robotic rehabilitation and evaluate the system empirically on stability and transparency.
The system provides a platform for further research on telerehabilitation and haptic communication in robotic rehabilitation. Working towards a system that allows the therapist, when desired, to intuitively interact with the patient while they are performing rehabilitation exercises using a robotic device. A modular telerehabilitation system is designed using the ARMin V (ETH Zurich) upper extremity exoskeleton as the patient side, and the haptic end-effector device Sigma.7 (Force Dimensions) as the therapist's side. A visualization is provided to the therapist side using Unity and additional features are added to improve usability. The telerehabilitation system is bilateral impedance controlled through a proportional-derivative controller.
An experiment is performed in which the observing participant is asked to resist motion (analyze stability) or to be compliant with the motion (analyze transparency).
The empirical analysis showed promising first results on position tracking, effective communication of haptic cues, stability, and transparency.
However, UDP communication rate could be raised, and the scaling of force and workspace between Sigma.7 and ARMin V could be better matched to improve transparency.