An article in the Journal of Neuroengineering and Rehabilitation reviewed a topic of how rehabilitation technology should meet in offering arm-hand training to stroke patients, based on recent principles of motor learning. It was  backgrounded by fact that stroke is the third leading cause of death in the USA and may cause serious long-term disabilities for its survivors. However, little is currently known about how different therapy modalities and therapy designs can influence brain reorganisation to support true recovery or compensation of this condition.

According to the article, persons who suffer from functional impairment after stroke often have not reached their full potential for recovery when they are discharged from hospital, especially the case for the recovery of arm-hand function which lags behind recovery of other functions. This leads to high levels of patient dissatisfaction for not receiving adequate and sufficient training possibilities after discharge from hospital. Four years after stroke, only 6% of stroke patients are satisfied with the functionality of their impaired arm.

Annick AA Timmermans, from Faculty of Biomedical Technology, Technical University Eindhoven, the Netherlands and Colleagues has motivated in multidisciplinary efforts for the development of rehabilitation robotics, virtual reality applications, monitoring of movement/force application and telerehabilitation. As this information may guide persons that are active in the area of rehabilitation technology development in the conceptualisation and design of technology-based training systems, according to this article.

The authors then search clinically database oriented as their aim to collect guidelines for technology design from the fields of motor learning/rehabilitation and evaluate technology that has been tested through clinical trial(s). After  collected all the guidelines, they formed the fondation of this article.

In the results, the authors described such State-of-the-art approaches in motor (re)learning in stroke and criteria for rehabilitation technology design, Active therapy approaches, Personal Goal Setting, Motivation, patient empowerment, gaming and support from friends/family, Nature and timing of feedback addresses different stages of motor learning, Technology supporting training of arm-hand function after stroke, Robotic training systems, and Sensor-based training systems. And their conclusion was:

This review confirms the commentary of previously study that technology for supporting upper limb training after stroke needs to align with the evolution in the field of rehabilitation towards functionally oriented approaches that influence function level, activity level and participation level. The review offers an inventory of points to focus on for development of future and/or adaptation of current rehabilitation technology.

Interested in complete reading about Motor Control Technology and Therapist Guidelines for Stroke Rehabilitation Design? Find full text article in 1.4 MB PDF filetype available here (source: jneuroengrehab.com).