Effects of the Physical Therapy Application for Elderly

Abstract

Currently, the number of elderly is continuously increasing and by 2020 in Thailand, the population of 60 years is one in six of the total population. Therefore, encouraging the elderly to take care of themselves will help make them live longer and have a good quality of life. Physical therapy is a method of treating the abnormal movement of the body and it must be performed regularly in order for the body to be continuously refreshed. Often, the elderly do not receive proper physical therapy due to travel difficulties and high cost of treatment. Hence, this research studied the possibility of using Kinect technology in the physical therapy program to help the physiotherapist properly. This study was quasi-experimental research using simple random sampling. All participants were interviewed for their demographic information and examined according to the five-arm muscle exercises. The results of the motion detection experiment using the Kinect camera and the experimental physical therapy program using the Kinect device show that Kinect can detect the movement very well and physiotherapy programs with Kinect devices help users perform more accurate physiotherapy compared to doing physical therapy. The data were analyzed by the mean, standard deviation. The results meant that physical therapy Application based on Kinect for Elderly could improve physical fitness and they have a positive effect on balance and thus on the quality of life.