Development of a cable-driven device for neuromuscular rehabilitation

Patients with neurological disorders often have upper extremity impairments. This work aimed to develop a rehabilitation device which enables neuromuscular training with adjustable force resistance and position assistance. The rehabilitation device consists of two compact cable-driven units (CDUs). Each CDU can easily be fixed to a suitable support surface. Using PID force control and impedance control algorithms, the device can produce user-defined resistive training with position assistance. A user interface is developed to setup the training intensities and control parameters. A single-case test for technical evaluation showed that the force control algorithms produced a mean force error of 3.78 N during static position, and 2.76 N during isotonic training. The impedance controller yielded a position tracking error of 0.08 m. It was concluded that the rehabilitation device managed to offer neuromuscular training with satisfactory accuracies.