Developing a digital game for domestic stroke patients’ upper extremity rehabilitation -design and usability assessment

Abstract

Digital games have been proven effective in upper extremity rehabilitation for stroke patients in addition to arousing higher motivation and feelings of pleasure. A well designed upper extremity rehabilitation digital game should intentionally meet the purpose of rehabilitation. Therefore, it is desirable to dmestically develop digital upper extremity rehabilitation games for the local hospitals as well as individual users. We are proposing this research to develop such digital games for rehabilitation and their feasibility assessment. A questionnaire was designed to evaluate the usability and feasibility associated with using this game. The results of this study can be summarized as follows: (1) the set of upper extremity rehabilitation game was named as upper extremity rehabilitation gardening game (UERG game). It is special designed for domestic stroke patients. (2) This UERG game uses Kinect’s skeletal tracking features and motion sensor to interaction with patients. (3) design features are as following: game contents include three difficult levels according to different upper limb motor function recovery stages; to record user’s motor performance; to provide feedback information (for example: to record the completed the task time and to detect whether the user has compensatory action, etc.). (4) A total of 10 patients to assess this set of games. The results showed that 90% of patients reported that using UERG game in treatment increased their treatment motivation.; 70% of them reported that this games is very interactive; 80% patients considered this game is conducive to recovery their upper extremity functions; 80% patients considered the feedback information provided help them to understand their performance in each session after training; 60% patients indicated the game interfaces were easy to operate and learning; 90% of patients reported that this game is enjoyment and satisfied with this game for rehabilitation. They are willing to continue to use.