Inexpensive Virtual Assisted Rehabilitation System (VARS) for Lower Part Injuries

Rehabilitation is a process (treatment) aimed at enabling recovery from injuries. Consequently, the patients rebuild their independence and return back to their normal life. For this reason, various systems have been developed such as Rehabilitation Gaming System (RGS), Computer Assisted Rehabilitation Environment (CAREN), etc. Most of these systems use the Virtual Reality (VR) which has a positive effect in minimizing recovery time. Unfortunately, such systems are not widely available in many countries especially third world country due to their high cost. In Lebanon, rehabilitation is limited to physiotherapy (exercises and activity). To overcome barriers of cost and availability in these countries, we propose a new system called Virtual Assisted Rehabilitation System (VARS). It provides rehabilitation for patients suffering from lower part injuries, such as muscular dystrophy and sports injuries, at lowest cost possible. VARS is made up of virtual reality eyeglasses for providing virtual environment, electromyogram (EMG) shield for analyzing muscles' activity in the lower part body, 2 degrees of freedom passive platform (2 rotational movements) at which the patient will stand, infrared tracking system and pressure sensors at the feet of patients to measure forces exerted on the ground. The collected data is sent to a host PC can be used for diagnosis by the physiotherapist. The latter then identifies specific gaming profile (type of game and time needed for treatment) for a patient depending on his status. VARS has been tested for different candidates and the result shows that gaming enhances EMG signal over time. The FSR profiles vary obviously between normal and abnormal patients and specific disease is determined (rheumatism).