Theragym

The Rehabilitation Robotics lab from Perelman School of Medicine seeks to build an affordable robotics gym for countries where the shortage of rehabilitation professionals and access to them prevents a full recovery post-injury for a large majority of the population. This gym includes a variety of different machines which allow operation without physician oversight leading to strong clinical outcomes, and a fun, interactive therapy in the form of video games. The project has been started, but is not close to completion.

Our team will focus on working with pedal bikes which will strengthen the lower arm, upper arm, and legs of the patient. These pedal bikes currently do not have any smart features, however we intend on adding an IMU in order to track the speed and number of rotations the patient pedals. Using this information, we will create an algorithm that will then feed back to the bike to power a stepper motor. This stepping motor would allow us to automatically rotate the knob that adjusts the level of resistance the bike pedals have. If time allows, we would also add force sensing to the bike pedals in order to gather information on how the patient grips the handles and use that data to inform us on how the patient is doing as well. Furthermore, as a software component we intend on building a web app that will allow physicians to follow the progress of various patients who are using the machines to see if desired goals and outcomes are being reached. If we have time, we also want to create games for patients who are using the pedal bikes (ie. integrating with a known game such as Temple Run).

A large component of our project will involve prototyping and testing quickly, because we want to deliver a usable product so getting input from our users and iterating accordingly will be extremely fundamental in our process. Ultimately, we hope our project will help to create a usable smart pedal bike system and our progress will allow the Rehabilitation Robotics lab to complete their vision of an affordable gym for developing countries.