Motion Assessments in Virtual Reality Environments

Traditional upper extremity rehabilitation techniques are often tedious and repetitive. Recent improvements to Virtual Reality games have allowed for increased customizability and show potential in the area of rehabilitation, creating a more integrative and exciting rehabilitation environment. The purpose of this thesis is to use Virtual Reality (VR) and motion capture to quantify different movement deficits that may arise due to MS, and to understand how the reaching motions of patients with MS may differ from healthy controls. Reaching motions are one of the motions commonly used in upper extremity rehabilitation measures, and through the study of reaching motions this research will have a long-term purpose of determining whether virtual reality can be used as an effective upper extremity rehabilitation tool. During data collection participants will wear a motion capture suit and a VR headset that displays movement targets. Participants will perform 3 levels focused on motions involving single arm movements and dual arm movements, in which they will be asked to perform reaching motions to hit the movement targets. The motion data collected from participants’ motion capture suits will then be analyzed and compared between MS and control groups.https://ecommons.udayton.edu/stander_posters/2857/thumbnail.jp