Sprained Ankle Physiotherapy Based Mechanism Synthesis and Stiffness Analysis of a Robotic Rehabilitation Device

Multi-Criteria Optimal Design of Cable Driven Ankle Rehabilitation Robot

“…Sometimes when a ligament is overstretched or broken it may pull off a piece of bone causing a fracture. Primary treatment for ankle injuries (Dai et al, 2004) includes, rest, ice, compression and elevation (RICE) of the affected foot. Ice is used to reduce swelling, compression stockings are used to firmly support the ankle and foot and elevation helps to minimize further swelling.…”

“…The position of the ankle joint in the robot does not remain constant and there is a possibility of small shift in the ankle joint location causing inconvenience to the patient and inaccurate control. Since the ankle movements in most exercises require less than four DOF motions, (Dai et al, 2004) proposed a parallel robot for sprained ankle treatments using a three and four DOF parallel mechanism with a central strut. Kinematic and stiffness analysis has been carried out for the proposed mechanism.…”

“…Thus the design and control of these robots are challenging tasks requiring multi-disciplinary skills and in-depth knowledge of human joint anatomy and movements. There are robotic devices currently in use such as MIT-MANUS for the upper limb rehabilitation (Krebs et al, 2003), LOKOMAT for gait training (Hesse et al, 2003) and Rutgers Stewart platform and other parallel robots (Dai et al, 2004) for ankle rehabilitation. However, the potential of robotics in rehabilitation has not been completely explored and key issues such as optimal design and intelligent and adaptive control, requires further research.…”

Inverse-kinematics-based control of a redundantly actuated platform for rehabilitation

“…This line of work started in 1999 when Dai and Massicks developed an equilateral ankle rehabilitation device based on parallel mechanisms [11]. This work was expanded by Dai et al [12] to create a family of lower mobility devices that can be used in the production of ankle physiotherapy platforms. A two-degree-of-freedom Cartesian device was developed by Yoon and Ryu [13] for reconfiguring the exercises for ankle physiotherapy.…”

A parallel robot for ankle rehabilitation-evaluation and its design specifications

“…We also emphasise to a device with adaptation to the specific characteristics of each patient's foot. In [8], the study of ankle injuries and ankle functional anatomy was based on an orientation image space; 3 platform-type ankle rehabilitation mechanisms were considered and their mobility, stiffness and constraints analyzed. But other design criteria are not analyzed nor is the construction and functional operation of such platforms.…”