A study of the relationship between muscles and sitting positions using a rehabilitation device

Abstract

Because of a growing elderly population and a declining birthrate, more elderly are needing nursing care, and the workload for doctors is growing heavier. Therefore, it’s necessary to save labor by using an at-home device to aid nursing. We focus on a device called Patakoro that can stretch and flex the knee joint, and plantar flex and dorsiflex the ankle joint. With electromyography and the Patakoro device, we constructed a system that can increase people’s walking abilities in motivation exercise. This motivation exercise can help paralytic people to strengthen their paralytic side by practicing with the non-paralytic side leg. As a result, we found that there is a significant difference in muscle activity within three sitting positions in which the height of the chair is placed at different levels.