The Tongue Enables Computer and Wheelchair Control for People with Spinal Cord Injury

Abstract

The Tongue Drive System (TDS) is a wireless and wearable assistive technology, designed to allow individuals with severe motor impairments such as tetraplegia to access their environment using voluntary tongue motion. Previous TDS trials used a magnetic tracer temporarily attached to the top surface of the tongue with tissue adhesive. We investigated TDS efficacy for controlling a computer and driving a powered wheelchair in two groups of able-bodied subjects and a group of volunteers with spinal cord injury (SCI) at C6 or above. All participants received a magnetic tongue barbell and used the TDS for five to six consecutive sessions. The performance of the group was compared for TDS versus keypad and TDS versus a sip-and-puff device (SnP) using accepted measures of speed and accuracy. All performance measures improved over the course of the trial. The gap between keypad and TDS performance narrowed for able-bodied subjects. Despite participants with SCI already having familiarity with the SnP, their performance measures were up to three times better with the TDS than with the SnP and continued to improve. TDS flexibility and the inherent characteristics of the human tongue enabled individuals with high-level motor impairments to access computers and drive wheelchairs at speeds that were faster than traditional assistive technologies but with comparable accuracy.

Safety and Efficacy of Medically Performed Tongue Piercing in People with Tetraplegia for Use with Tongue-Operated Assistive Technology

“…Each task was repeated 3 times, and the ability of the participants to perform each task was evaluated using speed and accuracy measures depending on the task. 11,19,20,40 For instance, Fitts' law was applied to evaluate computer access tasks, such as center-out tapping. This task consisted…”

“…10,11 The human tongue can move rapidly and accurately such that the tip can touch every tooth. [12][13][14][15] The direct connection between the brain and tongue generally remains intact even after high-level SCIs.…”

Epidermal radio frequency electronics for wireless power transfer

“…Recent research and development in wearable technologies has yielded a broad range of devices with applications in daily health monitoring 1 , activity tracking 2,3 , data logging 4 , human-machine interfaces 5,6 and clinical diagnostics 7,8 . Future advances in this rapidly evolving area will improve processes for delivering health care 9 and for reshaping personal lifestyles to enhance well-being 10 .…”

Control interfaces to actively support the arm function of men with Duchenn Muscular Dystrophy

“…non-invasive control interfaces for intention detection Figure 17: Tongue-movement-based interfaces. The tongue-movement-based interface developed by [119]. This system has two inductive coils mounted at the lateral parts of the mouth and a ferromagnetic material attached at the tip of the tongue.…”

“…The tongue-movement-based control interface developed by the research group of Prof. M. Ghovanloo at the GT-Bionics Lab (Georgia Institute of Technology, USA) is a wireless, unobtrusive, and wearable assistive technology that enables SCI patients to control computers and powered wheelchairs [118,119] (see Fig. 17 and Additional file 6).…”