Physiotherapy: Design and implementation of a wearable sleeve using IMU sensor and VR to measure elbow range of motion

Abstract

Range of motion (RoM) is the measurement of angular movement of joints that defines the joints flexibility. It is crucial to measure RoM while performing musculo-skeletal diagnostics. The physiotherapy and the visits to hospitals can be very costly and demands a great deal of time; also most of the current digital instruments, used to measure RoM, are very expensive and hard to use. In this paper a digital wearable sleeve device is designed and tested which is cheap, time efficient and easy to use. The designed device is tested to be within 95 % agreement with Universal Goniometer (UG) when tested using Bland Altman Plots. Patients can take their measurements on their own and visualize results on their desktops or mobile phones. Patients also have graphical feedback, highlighting the extent of variation between their exercise performance and standard exercise. In addition to this; patients can also compare their current exercise from previous exercise using Kalmogorov-Simronov (K-S) test automatically. To make exercising more fun, we have developed 3D VR (Virtual Reality) gaming environment for elbow flexion, elbow supination and pronation and elbow extension exercises where patient can exercise in an interactive environment and visualize their progress side by side.