Kinect V2 Performance Assessment in Daily-Life Gestures: Cohort Study on Healthy Subjects for a Reference Database for Automated Instrumental Evaluations on Neurological Patients

Abstract

Background The increase of sanitary costs related to poststroke rehabilitation requires new sustainable and cost-effective strategies for promoting autonomous and dehospitalized motor training. In the Riprendo@Home and Future Home for Future Communities research projects, the promising approach of introducing low-cost technologies that promote home rehabilitation is exploited. In order to provide reliable evaluation of patients, a reference database of healthy people's performances is required and should consider variability related to healthy people performances. Methods 78 healthy subjects performed several repetitions of daily-life gestures, the reaching movement (RM) and hand-to-mouth (HtMM) movement with both the dominant and nondominant upper limbs. Movements were recorded with a Kinect V2. A synthetic biomechanical protocol based on kinematical, dynamical, and motor control parameters was used to assess motor performance of the healthy people. The investigation was conducted by clustering participants depending on their limb dominancy (right/left), gender (male/female), and age (young/middle/senior) as sources of variability. Results Results showed that limb dominancy has minor relevance in affecting RM and HtMM; gender has relevance in affecting the HtMM; age has major effect in affecting RM and HtMM. Conclusions An investigation of healthy subjects' upper limb performances during daily-life gestures was performed with the Kinect V2 sensor. Findings will be the basis for a database of normative data for neurological patients' motor evaluation.

Low-Cost Tracking Systems Allow Fine Biomechanical Evaluation of Upper-Limb Daily-Life Gestures in Healthy People and Post-Stroke Patients

“…As expected by previous findings in the literature [ 50 ], no observable differences in motor performances were found when considering the healthy dominant and non-dominant limbs in a simple gesture, such as the reaching movement, according to the Kinect V2. It is well-known that dominant and non-dominant limbs have a tendency to specialize in dynamical and static motor tasks respectively [ 52 ], and the dominant arm can achieve more varied and flexible control over movement trajectories, while accuracy and precision are comparable [ 53 ].…”

“…For healthy people, criteria for eligibility were—being neurologically and orthopedically intact [ 50 ]. A cohort composed of 77 healthy subjects (46 males, 31 females, mean age 41.87 ± 19.34), unaware of the purpose of the study, was enrolled for the experiment, after giving an informed consent.…”

“…The enrolled subjects performed the RM (portrayed in Figure 2 ), according to the protocol described in [ 50 ]. The RM was chosen as it is a paradigmatic gesture for upper-limb rehabilitation, and is fundamental for autonomy in daily life activities, because it simultaneously: (1) involves a multi-joint coordination, (2) involves the capability of elevating the arm against gravity, (3) allows to reach for desired objects, (4) allows interaction with the environment.…”

“…The recorded data were used to compute the following outcome measures (according to the revision of a previously presented protocol [ 50 ]):…”

“…Supported by promising evidences found in the literature, especially when considering healthy people, in this paper Kinect V2 is presented as a tool for the evaluation of the motor performances of neurological patients, during the execution of the Reaching Movement (RM), further exploiting the data presented in previous studies [ 50 ]. Thus, this paper investigates and characterizes the presence of differences in performances of healthy subjects, during the execution of RM, compared to post-stroke hemiparetic patients, with a more or a less-impaired limb, with the aim of better understanding the possibility of building strong rehabilitation paradigms, based on low-cost tracking technologies.…”