Robotic Hand Orthosis Providing Grasp Assistance for Patients with Brachial Plexus Injuries

项目摘要/摘要 机械手矫形器为臂丛神经损伤患者提供抓握帮助 臂丛是一个神经网络，它将起源于颈髓的信号传递到 肩膀、手臂、手和手指。这些神经提供运动功能和感觉给那些 结构。成人臂丛外伤性损伤可导致上肢瘫痪 严重程度不一。手术干预可以恢复肩部、上半部的运动和控制 手臂和小臂通过肌肉和神经移植。然而，手的移动和控制是困难的 恢复，导致严重残疾和受损患者的生活质量下降 这种损伤后的功能。机器人外骨骼技术可以用来提供一种 一种能显著提高瘫痪手的灵活性和灵活性的辅助装置。 这项研究的总体目标是设计、制造、集成和测试一种轻量级和 旨在通过完全可控的个体恢复手功能的便携式机器人手矫形器 手指动作。这一目标是基于这样一种假设，即使用这种机械手矫形器将 结果显著改善了成人臂丛神经损伤患者的手能力。 通过南安普顿手评估程序(Shap)。 为了实现这一点，几个新颖的设计方面被结合在一起。微型直线的使用 致动器和轻质材料允许马达和传感器全部安装在 并消除了对笨重的外部执行机构的需要。此外，执行机构还具有 内置力感应功能，可提供对每个人施加的力的反馈 手指，甚至在接触抓住的物体之前也是如此。此外，手腕屈曲/伸展是 提供动力，产生了比通常在机器人矫形器中发现的更现实的抓取范例。 此外，还将设计一个直观的控制系统，以充分利用 每个手指，允许不同的抓取几何和动作。 这项研究的具体目标摘要如下： 1.设计并制作机器手矫形器的原型，目标是创造一种独特的灵巧、 轻便轻便的设备。此外，充分利用 矫形器的功能将被设计出来。这将导致开发一个 确定实验研究平台的可行性设计和假设。 2.通过将机器人矫形器提供给一小群成年人进行可行性试验 因臂丛神经损伤而瘫痪的患者。将对患者进行评估 通过Shap，他们在戴矫形器和不戴矫形器的情况下各自的得分将被评估为 确定他们在灵巧度和功能方面的改进水平。

Project Summary/Abstract Robotic Hand Orthosis Providing Grasp Assistance for Patients with Brachial Plexus Injuries The brachial plexus is a network of nerves that transfers signals originating in the cervical spinal cord to the shoulder, arm, hand, and fingers. These nerves provide motor function and sensation to those structures. Traumatic injury to the brachial plexus in adults can result in paralysis of the upper limb in varying degrees of severity. Surgical intervention can restore motion and control to the shoulder, upper arm, and lower arm through muscle and nerve grafts. However, hand mobility and control is difficult to restore, resulting in severe disability and decrease in quality of life for patients with impaired functionality following such an injury. Robotic exoskeleton technology can be utilized to provide an assistive device that provides significant improvement in the mobility and dexterity of a paralyzed hand. The overall objective of this research is to design, fabricate, integrate, and test a lightweight and portable robotic hand orthosis intended to restore hand functionality through fully controllable individual finger actuation. This objective is based on the hypothesis that use of such a robotic hand orthosis will result in significant improvement of hand ability for adults with brachial plexus injury, as evaluated through the Southampton Hand Assessment Procedure (SHAP). To achieve this, several novel design aspects are incorporated. The use of miniature linear actuators and lightweight materials allows for the motors and sensors to all mount atop the dorsum of the hand, and eliminate the need for bulky external actuation units. In addition, the actuators have inbuilt force sensing capabilities to provide feedback on the force being applied to each individual finger, even before contact is made with a grasped object. Furthermore, wrist flexion/extension is powered, resulting in a more realistic grasping paradigm than is commonly found in robotic orthoses. Moreover, an intuitive control system will be designed in order to fully capitalize on the controllability of each finger, allowing for varied grasp geometries and motions. A summary of the specific aims of this study are: 1. Design and prototype the robotic hand orthosis with the goal of creating a uniquely dexterous, lightweight and portable device. In addition, the control methodologies required to exploit the full capabilities of the orthosis will be designed. This will result in the development of an experimental research platform to determine the viability of the design and hypothesis. 2. Perform a feasibility trial of the robotic orthosis device by providing it to a small cohort of adult patients suffering from paralysis due to a brachial plexus injury. The patients will be assessed via the SHAP, and their respective scores both with and without the orthosis will be evaluated to determine their level of improvement in dexterity and function.