IEEE Technology and Society Magazine - December 2015 - 26

Table 1. Pros and Cons of the Technological and Clinical Aspects Associated with Innovative Systems for TRH.
TRH System

TECHNOLOGICAL
Pros

Cons

Pros

Cons

Marker-Based
Optical
Systems

high sample rates, suitable
for fast movement, like in
sports. Can accommodate
large capture areas.

the subject must be
provided with one or
more markers and the
accuracy depends on the
kind of marker used.

highly standardized systems
for clinical movement
analysis.

require a dedicated
laboratory, not
always available in
clinical settings. time
consuming.

EMG

very accurate, and with
the capability of following
small movements of the
arms.

needs initial setup and
medical support during
the registration of the
data to be analyzed.

allows definition of muscle
activation during movement.
Useful for determining
co-activations and muscle
synergies.

Does not give
information about the
quality of muscular
activation. potentially
affected by cross-talk
phenomena.

IMU

real time, easy setup,
compact, cost-effective.

sensitivity to interference
for magnetic systems,
limited range, not always
suitable for very fast
moves.

portability. Useful for
movement analysis in
real settings (home, gym,
outdoor).

requires technical skills
for post-processing
analysis.

RGB-D

the cheapest and the
better result considering
a higher spatial resolution
that these systems are
able to achieve.

needs cleaning and postprocessing, occlusion
areas can occur. only for
human tracking.

easy to use. availability.
reproduces clinical
movement analysis and
diagnosis allowing off-line
evaluation.

generally allows only
subjective evaluation.

of data for generating feedback to
the patient.
TRH systems may benefit from
the use of the Internet as they provide the ability to use a set of very
useful services and approaches.
For instance, the opportunity to
exploit remote systems for distributed computing can make the
use of one of the aforementioned
technological approaches computationally more affordable than using
local hosts. In addition, the Internet
allows us to exploit the cloud repository for both data and algorithms,
in order to lighten the workload for
the local device. This distributed
approach enables the activation of
mobile entities for diagnosis and
analysis of patients, avoiding the
need for laboratories with expensive equipment and onerous methodologies. Internet approaches can
allow the implementation of other

CLINICAL

support services for patients and
the clinical personnel, such as web
or mobile applications for interactive training, skills updating, and
so on. The Internet computing
paradigm sets up a basis for the
implementation of pervasive and
ubiquitous systems, which are able
to produce transparent, miniaturized, self-replacing systems in the
context of the forthcoming Internet
of Things.

■

New Trends and Research
Several recent research projects
have proposed ICT solutions and
TRH applications through multimedia and gamification techniques
for the rehabilitation of patients
with physical disabilities. An overview of the most recent and effective best practices follows, so as
to give an outlook on new trends
regarding TRH:
IEEE Technology and Society Magazine

∕

Rewire - Rehabilitative Wayout in
Responsive Home Environments
project (http://www.rewire-project.
eu) is a rehabilitation platform
based on an innovative application of virtual reality, with
the purpose of creating a customized health system that
can be individually performed
by patients in their homes, to
improve their recovery after disease, and to avoid excessively
long hospital stays. The platform
consists of three hierarchical
components: the patient station,
which allows the patient to follow a path through rehabilitation involving mini games; the
hospital station, used by staff in
hospitals to define rehabilitation
treatment, selecting exercises
and showing improvement; and
the networking station, which
allows data collection about

december 2015

http://www.rewire-project

Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of IEEE Technology and Society Magazine - December 2015