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Robots for Measurement/Clinical Assessment

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Neurorehabilitation Technology

Abstract

Neurological disorders such as stroke, traumatic brain injury, cerebral palsy, or spinal cord injury result in partial or complete sensorimotor impairments in the affected limbs. To provide an optimal rehabilitation, a detailed assessment of the nature and degree of the sensorimotor deficits is crucial. Valid, reliable, and standardized assessments are essential to define the therapy setting. Many clinical assessments suffer from limitations such as poor validity, low reliability, and low sensitivity. However, as often no alternative exists, they are widely used in clinical settings. Rehabilitation robotics is a promising technology that can provide objective measurements, which could help overcome the common drawbacks of clinical assessments. This chapter focuses on the new possibilities robotic devices offer in the field of neurorehabilitation. Different strategies to evaluate sensorimotor impairments using robotic platforms are presented. We discuss how a link between conventional scales and robotic assessments could be established, and how this could result in more objective, clinically accepted assessment scales.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Rehabilitation Engineering Lab, Department of Mechanical and Process Engineering, ETH Zurich, LEO B 9.2, Leonhardstrasse 27, 8092, Zurich, Switzerland

    Olivier Lambercy & Roger Gassert

  2. Hocoma AG, Industriestrasse 4, 8604, Volketswil, Switzerland

    Lars Lünenburger

  3. Spinal Cord Injury Center, University of Zurich, Balgrist University Hospital, Forchstrasse 340, 8008, Zurich, Switzerland

    Marc Bolliger

Authors
  1. Olivier Lambercy
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  2. Lars Lünenburger
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  3. Roger Gassert
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  4. Marc Bolliger
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Correspondence to Marc Bolliger .

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Editors and Affiliations

  1. Uniklinik Balgrist, Forchstr. 340, Zürich, 8008, Switzerland

    Volker Dietz

  2. , ARTORG Center for Biomedical Engineering, Universität Bern, Murtenstrasse 21, Bern, CH-3010, Switzerland

    Tobias Nef

  3. Rehabilitation Institute of Chicago, Illinois, 60611, USA

    William Zev Rymer

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Lambercy, O., Lünenburger, L., Gassert, R., Bolliger, M. (2012). Robots for Measurement/Clinical Assessment. In: Dietz, V., Nef, T., Rymer, W. (eds) Neurorehabilitation Technology. Springer, London. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4471-2277-7_24

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4471-2277-7_24

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