Abstract
Movements of the upper limbs are complicated, various and indispensable for daily activities. It, therefore, is important for the aged to exercise to keep their upper limb function. Also when something is wrong with the upper limb function because of disease or disorder, rehabilitation along with medical treatment is needed to recover function. Application of robotics and virtual reality technology makes possible for new training methods and exercises on upper limb rehabilitation and for quantitative evaluations to enhance the qualitative effect of training. We involved in a project managed by NEDO (New Energy and Industrial Technology Development Organization as a semi-governmental organization under the Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry, Japan), “Rehabilitation System for the Upper Limbs and Lower Limbs, ”and developed a 3-D exercise machine for upper limb (EMUL) . In this paper, We described softwares to control the moving trajectory of the patients hand by EMUL. They were able to be applied the system to practical rehabilitation training such as passive exercise training, active-assistive exercise training or active exercise training.
