We design, develop, and evaluate interactive systems for semi-automated stroke rehabilitation. Combining insights from interaction design, medical rehabilitation, computer vision, and machine learning, we endeavor to create intuitive, low-cost and high impact systems. Our current work builds on over a decade of experience building functioning systems for hospitals, clinics and the home.

SARAH: Semi-Automated Rehabilitation At Home

The SARAH project proposes the development of a low-cost, unobtrusive sensing system for rehabilitation training and assessment of activities of daily living at the home. SARAH relies on the remote participation of the therapist for structuring and adapting therapy, as well as using therapist expertise to reduce the computational challenge of the analysis. Combining this expert human knowledge with computer vision based computational movement analysis allows the system to provide accurate and interpretable feedback summaries to the patient and therapist about patient improvement. The SARAH project is generously supported by a $1.1 million grant from the National Science Foundation (#2014499).

STARS: Sensor Technologies Applied to Rehabilitation in Stroke

STARS is a collaborative Rehabilitation Engineering Research Center program led by the Shirley Ryan AbilityLab in partnership with the University of Southern California, Northwestern University, the University of California at Irvine, and Virginia Tech. STARS focuses on the important role of clinical therapists in implementing routine rehabilitation care in stroke survivors, and on enhancing their capacity to provide evidence-based, individualized, and precise therapy. As part of this RERC, the INR lab applies a human-in-the-loop, video-based approach to the low cost instrumentation and computational rating of the Action Research Arm Test (ARAT). The goal of this research is to 1) develop computational tools to assist the standardization and interpretability of ARAT scoring by expert therapists, and 2) provide automated assessments and recommendations that assist the efficacy and effectiveness of the administration of the test by therapists and allow therapists to direct more of their effort on evidence-based treatment. The STARS program is generously supported by a $5 million grant from the National Institute on Disability, Independent Living, and Rehabilitation Research (#90REGE0010).