Development of a fabric-based soft hand exoskeleton for rehabilitation and assistance
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Maldonado Mejía, Juan Camilo | 2022
According to the World Health Organization (WHO), stroke is the third leading cause of disability and the second leading cause of death worldwide, mainly affecting lower-middle-income countries. The upper limb, specifically the hand, is one of the most common motor disabilities following a stroke. The hand plays a vital role in performing activities of daily living (ADLs), so hand rehabilitation is essential. With technological development in recent years, soft robotics has emerged as a possible solution to provide physical and cognitive assistance during rehabilitation. This master’s thesis presents the development of two versions of a replicable hand exoskeleton for hand rehabilitation and assistance in ADLs based on soft robotics for stroke survivors, the ExHand Exoskeleton. The device is evaluated through standard functionality and usability tests on ten healthy subjects. The results demonstrate that the device satisfies the requirements of a hand exoskeleton for rehabilitation and assistance with a glove weight of 137 g and total system weight of 971 g, as well as its actuators perform a distal force of 9.18 ± 1.16 N, sufficient to grasp different objects associated with ADLs. Likewise, the person using the device can perform different daily living activities, such as writing and eating. In addition, the ExHand Exoskeleton can perform eight types of grasping with 24 objects of different shapes, sizes, textures, weights, and stiffness with 80.80% similarity to a healthy user. Also, the user satisfaction questionnaire results indicated a positive mean score of 4.27 ± 0.34 on a Likert scale ranging from 1 to 5. Finally, two surveys were conducted to evaluate the acceptance and intention of use by clinicians, showing that the device is a valuable and easy-to-use tool to support neurological patients.
LEER