EACH year, 700,000 people in the US and 100,000 in the UK suffer a stroke. To help them regain the use of their limbs, some doctors use electrodes attached to the skin to stimulate their muscles.
Previous research has shown that when patients make a conscious effort to move, the technique has a better success rate. So researchers at the University of Southampton in the UK built a workstation that stimulates muscles in the upper arm while a robotic device helps the patient to exercise it. 鈥淚t is the first of its kind to combine robotic rehabilitation technology with functional electrical stimulation,鈥� says lead researcher, Christopher Freeman.
In a trial with five patients, four showed improvement in the impaired arm (Medical Engineering and Physics, ).
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