Effects of robot-assisted wrist therapy in chronic stroke patients: a kinematic approach

The main goal of this study is to present preliminary results on wrist robot-aided rehabilitation in chronic post-stroke patients, assessed by using clinical scales and kinematic parameters. Eleven chronic stroke patients participated in the study. The InMotion 3 robotic system for the wrist rehabilitation was used. Clinical scales were used for assessment. Kinematic parameters were measured at the robot's end-effector. Outcome clinical measures show a decrease in motor impairment after the treatment. The kinematic data show an improvement between admission and discharge. Our results show that the robot-assisted wrist training can contribute to reduce the motor impairment: clinical outcome measures and kinematic parameters demonstrate this improvement. The analysis of kinematic data associated to a quantitative motor assessment provided by clinical evaluation scales is able to quantify the rate of improvement in the quality of motion obtained after robot-assisted wrist therapy in stroke patients.