Bimanual wearable robotic orthoses to promote cortical function and recovery from stroke

中风是一种心血管疾病，是大脑血液流动问题的结果。它是加拿大神经相关残疾的主要原因-超过30万加拿大人生活在中风的影响中。中风患者每年在加拿大医院或家庭护理机构停留超过500万天，每年花费超过35亿美元，包括直接成本，如医生和医院成本，以及间接成本，如工资损失和生产力下降。该项目提出了一种创新的技术和康复疗法，以显著加快中风患者的康复。建议的方案将改善中风患者的健康，提高医疗服务效率，引领加拿大生物技术领域的新创新，并最终降低中风对社会的成本。该项目的重点是从中风引起的手臂损伤中恢复，因为这影响了大约55%-75%的中风患者。我们过去的工作表明，中风导致手臂虚弱的加拿大人的生活质量随着时间的推移而下降。在这项工作中，我们将设计一个创新的机器人系统，以实现一种新颖的康复疗法，它既使用虚弱的手臂，也使用非中风的手臂。机器人系统将是可穿戴的、便携的和轻便的，因此它可以在医院和家庭中使用。该项目的成果将被转化为参与这项研究的知识/技术用户和参与研究的医院，以确保中风患者能够及时获得这项突破性的技术和治疗。

Stroke, a form of cardiovascular disease, is the result of a blood flow problem in the brain. It is the leading cause ofneurologically related disability in Canada - over 300,000 Canadians live with the effects of stroke. Individuals with strokespend over five million days in Canadian hospitals or residential care facilities every year, costing over $3.5 billion a year inboth direct costs, such as physician and hospital costs, and indirect costs, such as lost wages and decreased productivity.This project proposes an innovative technology and rehabilitation therapy to drastically accelerate recovery from stroke.The proposed regimen will improve the health of stroke patients, improve health service efficiency, lead to new Canadianinnovation in the biotechnology sector, and ultimately reduce the cost of stroke to society. The specific focus of this project ison recovery from arm impairments caused by stroke since this affects approximately 55-75% of people with stroke. Our pastwork has shown that the quality of life declines with time for Canadians who have a weak arm caused by a stroke.In this work we will design an innovative robotic system to enable a novel rehabilitation therapy that uses both the weakand non-stroke affected arms. The robotic system will be wearable, portable and lightweight such that it can be used both inhospitals and homes. Outcomes of this project will be translated to the knowledge/technology users participating in thisresearch and to participating hospitals to ensure that individuals with stroke gain timely access to this ground-breakingtechnology and treatment.