Interactive virtual environment training for safe street crossing of right hemisphere stroke patients with Unilateral Spatial Neglect

Abstract

Purpose. The goal of this study was to determine whether non immersive interactive virtual environments are an effective medium for training individuals who suffer from Unilateral Spatial Neglect (USN) as a result of a right hemisphere stroke, and to compare it to a standard computer visual scanning training. Method. Participants included 19 patients with right hemisphere stroke in two groups, 11 in an experimental group were given computer desktop-based Virtual Reality (VR) street crossing training and 8 in a control group who were given computer based visual scanning tasks, both for a total of twelve sessions, 9 hours total, over four weeks. Measures included: 1. Standard USN assessments, paper and pencil and ADL checklist; 2. Test on the VR street program; and 3. Actual street crossing videotaped. Testing was performed pre and post intervention. Results. The VR group achieved on the USN measures results that equaled those achieved by the control group treated with conventional visual scanning tasks. They improved more on the VR test and they did better on some measures of the real street crossing. Conclusions. Despite several limitations in this study the present results support the effectiveness of the VR street program in the treatment of participants with USN, and further development of the program.

Validation of a low-cost virtual reality system for training street-crossing. A comparative study in healthy, neglected and non-neglected stroke individuals

“…The system presented by Katz et al (Katz, Ring, Naveh, Kizony, Feintuch, & Weiss, 2005) and Weiss et al (Weiss, Naveh, & Katz, 2003) had graphical limitations and used the arrow keys of a keyboard to point the avatar's head left, right or forward to see whether vehicles were approaching from either direction. To overcome these limitations, Kim et al (Kim et al, 2010) and Peskine et al (Peskine et al, 2011) developed a 3D immersive world and used an HMD in an attempt to provide participants with a more realistic street-crossing scenario.…”

“…Three previous studies have used 3D virtual street environments to assess (Kim et al, 2010;Peskine et al, 2011) and treat (Katz, Ring, Naveh, Kizony, Feintuch, & Weiss, 2005;Weiss, Naveh, & Katz, 2003) USN in a stroke population. While the assessment systems allowed subjects to interact using a head mounted display (HMD), a head tracker, and a mouse, the training system used a desktop monitor and a keyboard.…”

Noninvasive brain stimulation in stroke rehabilitation

“…8,9 In recent years, new strategies in repetitive motor training have raised substantial interest, including constraint-induced therapy, 10 -12 bilateral arm training, 13,14 body-weight support treadmill training, [15][16][17] robotic assisted therapy, 18 -24 and use of virtual reality protocols. [25][26][27][28][29][30] …”

Clinical Validation of a Virtual Environment Test for Safe Street Crossing in the Assessment of Acquired Brain Injury Patients with and without Neglect

“…This technology, which has demonstrated its validity in the area of neuropsychology [2], can overcome some of the limitations of traditional evaluation methods. The main advantages of using VR are that it permits the evaluation and treatment in a realistic environment that is related to daily life and that is safer and has intrinsic ecological validity [5] [7]. VR can generate different environments that allow more interaction and sense of presence and that improve the motivation of the users while enabling a precise control of each session to be maintained [8].…”