A quantifiable assessment device for stroke patients

After a person suffers from a stroke, the most common disability that arises from it is paralysis. In order to assist the patient to return to his/her normal way of life as much as possible, a rehabilitation program is tailored for the patient. However, before any rehabilitation program could be given to the patient, assessment tests has to be carried out. Motor function assessments are basically assessment of human muscle strength. The objective of this project is to design and develop a quantifiable assessment device for stroke patients. For collection of data, the subject was asked to perform a muscle assessment which is a combination of isoinertial and isokinetic muscle assessment. The motion was then captured and analysed using a 2-Dimensional kinematic video analysis. The result of the assessment reveals that the fluidity of the motion is shown clearly. The data of two different set of performances could also be readily differentiated, albeit the progress of the patient may be just a little. This has shown that the assessment designed in this project for a stroke patient through kinematic analysis is able to assess the ability of the patient. However, this assessment has been carried out on one muscle group and no actual stroke patients are involved. The assessment could be conducted on stroke patients to ensure there is a direct correlation between assessment and clinical measures.

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