To determine the most effective interventions for poststroke patients, it is imperative to monitor the recovery process. Robotic exoskeletons' built-in sensing capabilities enable accurate kinematic measurement with no additional setup time. Although position sensors used in exoskeletons are accurate, a mismatch between the robot's and the human's joints can lead to inaccurate measurements. In addition, the robot's residual dynamics can interfere with human's natural movements and the kinematic metrics assessed in the robot would not be representative of the human's movement in free-motion. So far, the accuracy of robotic exoskeletons in assessing upper-body kinematics has not been verified. The bilateral upper-body Harmony exoskeleton has features favorable to minimize joint misalignments and the robot's residual dynamics. In this study, we examined Harmony's ability to accurately assess Cartesian-space kinematic parameters associated with the wearer's movement quality. We analyzed data collected from eight healthy participants that executed point-to-point movements with and without the presence of the robot and at fast and slow speeds. Ground truth was acquired with an optical motion capture, and we extracted the kinematic parameters from the measured data. The results suggest that Harmony can accurately measure kinematic parameters associated with movement quality, and these parameters could appropriately reflect wearer's natural movements at a slow speed. Therefore, Harmony could aid the evaluation of the effectiveness of different interventions, which is more sensitive and efficient than currently adopted clinical outcomes. This allows for individualization of a treatment plan and a detailed follow-up.

中文翻译：

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在 Harmony 外骨骼中评估笛卡尔空间中的上半身运动质量是可行的


为了确定中风后患者最有效的干预措施，必须监测康复过程。机器人外骨骼的内置传感功能可实现精确的运动学测量，无需额外的设置时间。尽管外骨骼中使用的位置传感器是准确的，但机器人和人类关节之间的不匹配可能会导致测量不准确。此外，机器人的残余动力学会干扰人类的自然运动，并且机器人中评估的运动学指标不能代表人类自由运动的运动。到目前为止，机器人外骨骼评估上半身运动学的准确性尚未得到验证。双侧上半身 Harmony 外骨骼具有有利于最大限度减少关节错位和机器人残余动力的功能。在这项研究中，我们检查了 Harmony 准确评估与佩戴者运动质量相关的笛卡尔空间运动学参数的能力。我们分析了从八名健康参与者收集的数据，这些参与者在机器人存在和不存在的情况下以快和慢的速度执行点对点运动。通过光学运动捕捉获得地面实况，我们从测量的数据中提取运动学参数。结果表明，Harmony 可以准确测量与运动质量相关的运动学参数，这些参数可以适当地反映佩戴者低速时的自然运动。因此，Harmony 可以帮助评估不同干预措施的有效性，这比目前采用的临床结果更加敏感和有效。这允许个性化的治疗计划和详细的随访。