The rehabilitation for stroke patients can be hard both physically and mentally. CETMA, S. Anna Institute and Rehalife Srl. designed and developed a serious game in virtual reality to improve arm rehabilitation for stroke patients.

How to facilitate rehabilitation in stroke patients?

“CETMA Virtual&Augmented Reality Area, specialized in interactive technologies, worked at the request of the rehabilitation center S. Anna Institute to develop a serious game in VR to facilitate arm rehabilitation in stroke patients. The serious game had to be set in a familiar virtual environment with ordinary objects, which is an important factor to make patients feel comfortable during the exercise. The challenge was to drive patients to interact with the virtual objects using their impaired arm to carry out movements of the hand useful for the rehabilitation.”

“To practice hand’s movement in virtual reality you need to detect every finger position. Thanks to the Manus VR Gloves, we were able to develop a VR serious game where patients are able to touch, grasp and move the digital objects in different scenarios according to the difficulties of the exercise. With this system, they can practice the serious game at home with minimum support, feel motivated and comfortable in a familiar environment and save the results of their sessions in a database that doctors can check remotely.”

CETMA, Technologies Design and Materials European Research Centre, is a Research and Technology Organization (RTO) based in Brindisi (Italy) with more than 20 years of applied research, experimental development and technology transfer in the field of advanced materials, ICT and product development.

CETMA Virtual & Augmented Reality Area part of New Technologies and Design Department is the unit specialised in advanced visual system and interactive technologies, including virtual and augmented reality. It operates in several sectors such as industry, cultural heritage, entertainment, security, and health, providing R&D consulting and innovative services.

Use Cases Of Manus VR

CETMA: Improving Rehabilitation For Stroke Patients