2017

Virtual Reality for Upper Limb Rehabilitation

Current gaming and virtual reality platforms have the potential to be employed as rehabilitation tools. In this project, we investigate the use of the Oculus Rift and Touch controllers to provide upper limb rehabilitation to teenagers with cerebral palsy.

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Error augmentation (EA) uses the concept of highlighting or accentuating deviations from motor goals to provide enhanced real-time feedback during rehabilitative exercises. With increased use of exergaming technology, exploration into visual error amplification of forward reaching tasks has begun. However, past studies have only evaluated the use of EA in 2D screen space while rotating the angle of reaching, whether in unimanual or bimanual tasks. Furthermore, exploration with immersive VR that can fully occlude vision of physical limb positioning has yet to be explored. In a single session experiment, the effectiveness of EA used to provide visual feedback for bilateral symmetry in two-handed reaching tasks was evaluated.