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A Portable Passive Rehabilitation Robot for Upper-Extremity Functional Resistance Training
It is very common for individuals to experience a loss of arm function after neurological injury. Robotic devices can assist in recovery; however, current devices are typically too large, bulky, and expensive to be routinely used in the clinic or at home. Here, we developed and validated a low-cost portable planar passive rehabilitation robot (PaRRo) that uses a unique mechanical design and miniature eddy current brakes instead of motors to directly resist the user during reaching motions. Theoretical and experimental results show that this device could potentially serve as a valuable clinical tool to restore arm function after neurological injury.
