The WalkTrainer: A Robotic System for Walking Rehabilitation

Abstract

Robots are excellent tools for providing motion. Their motion is precise, stiff and as repeatable as we need. This led the Swiss Foundation for Cyberthosis (SFC) to exploit robotics jointly with the muscle electrostimulation as intelligent rehabilitation devices. This paper will present one of this devices developed by the "Laboratoire des Systemes Robotiques (LSRO) at the EPFL (Ecole Polytechnique Federale de Lausanne). This device called "The WalkTrainerlM" is a robotic rehabilitation system composed by a deambulator, a pelvis orthosis, a body weight support, two leg orthoses and a real time controlled electrostimulator. The WalkTrainerlM is a verticalized system

The value of robotic systems in stroke rehabilitation

“…WalkTrainer (Swortec SA, Monthey, Switzerland) allows for overground training, using a motor to follow patient movements and has a parallel robotic structure to control pelvic motion in 6 DOF [63].…”

Pelvic motion implementation on the WalkTrainer

“…For the complete measurement method refer to [5,21]. The adopted referential is depicted in Figure 1.…”

“…However for the measurement the orthoses are not mounted on the mobile frame. As explained in [5] the WalkTrainer is equipped with:…”

Gait planning for effective rehabilitation - From gait study to application in clinical rehabilitation

“…The works that have been developed to automate the gait rehabilitation training process include: Lokomat [2], WalkTrainer [3], and a gait rehabilitation system developed in the Nanyang Technological University (NTU) [4] as shown in Fig. 1.…”