SpastoPro: Portable Neurorehab Device for fine motor control

In India, each year, about 1.8 million people suffer a stroke. Eighty percent of all stroke patients experience some level of Upper limb spasticity. 

While timely treatment can reverse most effects of stroke, fine motor movement such as the one required by fingers is difficult to reverse completely. Most chronic cases reach a dead end after recovering about 70%. However, the remaining 30% fine motor movement greatly affects their activities of daily living (ADLs). Learned non-use thereafter leads to further muscle wasting.

Currently, most physiotherapy clinics perform these exercises manually. With manual therapy, it is possible to recover shoulder, elbow, and wrist movements to a large extent. However, fine finger movement is the hardest to recover. And yet, it is the most critical movement to perform activities of daily living. Some physiotherapists claim that a minimum of 10000 cycles is needed to regain the fine-motor movement of fingers. These exercises are tiring for the therapist and the patient causing a loss of motivation and adherence in both. And this is where precisely that automation is needed.