Rehabilitation programs based on virtual reality are becoming an important complementary resource to conventional motor therapies for patients suffering from cerebrovascular accident (CVA) or neurodegenerative diseases. Stimulating several sensory systems, especially the visual and auditory systems, the patient's immersion in virtual environments promotes and intensifies the transit of information (input / output) in the central nervous system.
“The expectation is that this will increase brain connectivity, by stimulating new neural connections necessary to recover losses caused by injuries or the patient’s own clinical condition”, he tells Agência FAPESP Alexandre Brandao, researcher at the Physics Institute of the State University of Campinas (Unicamp) and at Brazilian Institute of Neuroscience and Neurotechnology (BRAINN), one of the Research, Innovation and Dissemination Centers (CEPIDs) supported by FAPESP.
Brandão is the main author of the study Biomechanics Sensor Node for Virtual Reality: A Wearable Device Applied to Gait Recovery for Neurofunctional Rehabilitation, awarded as “Best Paper” in the area of Virtual Reality at the 20th International Conference on Computational Science and its Applications – ICCSA). Scheduled to take place at the University of Cagliari, in Italy, the event was held in a virtual environment due to the pandemic.
The study resulted in the development of a new device, the Biomechanics Sensor Node (BSN), capable of capturing user data and controlling virtual environments, and new software, which integrates the BSN with Unity Editor, one of the most used programs currently in construction. of digital environments. “The union between the device and the software allows patients in the process of motor recovery to interact with virtual reality environments at the same time that therapists have access to data on movements performed during the session”, informs Brandão.
The study received support from FAPESP through a post-doctoral scholarship awarded to Brandão for the development of the project “Application and development of virtual reality tools to complement conventional therapy in stroke patients and assessment of recovery using brain connectivity through fMRI."
The study Biomechanics Sensor Node for Virtual Reality: A Wearable Device Applied to Gait Recovery for Neurofunctional Rehabilitation can be accessed at https://link.springer.com/chapter/10.1007/978-3-030-58820-5_54.
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