Neurorehabilitation Technology
Neurorehabilitation Technology provides an accessible, practical overview of the all the major areas of development and application in the field. The initial chapters provide a clear, concise explanation of the rationale for robot use and the science behi
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Volker Dietz • Tobias Nef William Zev Rymer Editors
Neurorehabilitation Technology
Editors Volker Dietz, M.D., FRCP Spinal Cord Injury Center University Hospital Balgrist Zurich Switzerland
Tobias Nef, Ph.D. Gerontology and Rehabilitation Group ARTORG Center for Biomedical Engineering Research University of Bern Switzerland
William Zev Rymer, M.B.B.S., Ph.D. Searle Research Center Rehabilitation Institute of Chicago Chicago, Illinois USA
ISBN 978-1-4471-2276-0 e-ISBN 978-1-4471-2277-7 DOI 10.1007/978-1-4471-2277-7 Springer London Dordrecht Heidelberg New York British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library Library of Congress Control Number: 2011944229 © Springer-Verlag London Limited 2012 Apart from any fair dealing for the purposes of research or private study, or criticism or review, as permitted under the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988, this publication may only be reproduced, stored or transmitted, in any form or by any means, with the prior permission in writing of the publishers, or in the case of reprographic reproduction in accordance with the terms of licenses issued by the Copyright Licensing Agency. Enquiries concerning reproduction outside those terms should be sent to the publishers. The use of registered names, trademarks, etc., in this publication does not imply, even in the absence of a specific statement, that such names are exempt from the relevant laws and regulations and therefore free for general use. Product liability: The publisher can give no guarantee for information about drug dosage and application thereof contained in this book. In every individual case the respective user must check its accuracy by consulting other pharmaceutical literature. Printed on acid-free paper Springer is part of Springer Science+Business Media (www.springer.com)
Foreword
Physical therapy is hard work. For the person undergoing neurorehabilitation, many factors, including frustration and the seemingly slow pace of visible improvement, stand in the way of neuromuscular recovery and functional gain. But what are the most effective rehabilitation strategies? What combination of these strategies provides the best overall outcome? What clinical scales offer the most accurate representation of functional change and quality of life? And, perhaps most important for the forward-looking clinician, is healthcare research addressing and funding this complex domain adequately? How could we develop effective techniques faster and deploy them with more confidence? If therapy is hard work for the patient, then navigating therapy research is similarly challenging to the practitioner. Then there is the infuriating corollary to the inherently slow pace of neurologic recovery: rehabilitation research studies depend on human-subjects testing, which is rate-limited, of course, by that same, slow pace of neural system recovery. We can’t win! Or can we? Three factors stand in our favor. First, the value of effective rehabilitation to society is i
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