[Brad Aiken, M.D., Neurological Rehabilitation Program] Well, the importance of rehabilitation
[Brad Aiken, M.D.] after somebody has a stroke is to help them regain
[Brad Aiken, M.D.] their functional independence as much as possible.
[Brad Aiken, M.D.] Often when someone has a stroke in many cases,
[Brad Aiken, M.D.] unfortunately they don't have a complete recovery,
[Brad Aiken, M.D.] no matter how good the acute treatment,
[Brad Aiken, M.D.] so they're left with weakness in an arm or a leg,
[Brad Aiken, M.D.] speech difficulty, vision problems.
[Brad Aiken, M.D.] They're not able to take care of themselves
[Brad Aiken, M.D.] to walk normally.
[Brad Aiken, M.D.] So the goal of the rehabilitation is to get them doing
[Brad Aiken, M.D.] as much as they can for themselves
[Brad Aiken, M.D.] to try and get them as independent as possible.
[Brad Aiken, M.D.] The idea of this is that the individual can,
[Brad Aiken, M.D.] put their weak arm in the tray on the robot,
[Brad Aiken, M.D.] and in response to interactive video interface,
[Brad Aiken, M.D.] that's a lot like playing video games.
[Brad Aiken, M.D.] They try and hit a target on a screen, for example,
[Brad Aiken, M.D.] or do other activities.
[Brad Aiken, M.D.] Or if the person, for example, can't move at all,
[Brad Aiken, M.D.] the robot will take them through the motion,
[Brad Aiken, M.D.] if they can perform the activity partially,
[Brad Aiken, M.D.] but not completely,
[Brad Aiken, M.D.] the robot will let them do what they can
[Brad Aiken, M.D.] and take them through the motion.
[Brad Aiken, M.D.] If they start to move in the wrong way,
[Brad Aiken, M.D.] the robot will correct the motion.
[Brad Aiken, M.D.] That this results in improvement
[Brad Aiken, M.D.] and the patient's ability to utilize the muscles,
[Brad Aiken, M.D.] to do functional activities.
[Brad Aiken, M.D.] And we think it works by retraining
[Brad Aiken, M.D.] or activating certain pathways in the brain.
[Cathy Crucet] The recoveries come very well.
[Cathy Crucet] I got out of the hospital February 2nd
[Cathy Crucet] and I'm already walking free,
[Cathy Crucet] and moving free, my arm isn't moving 100%,
[Cathy Crucet] but they told me it will soon.
[Cathy Crucet] The first I was at laugh, I was laughing for everything
[Cathy Crucet] because it was the first time I had ever seen it.
[Cathy Crucet] I had never worked with a robot.
[Cathy Crucet] And then once I got it going with my own arm, I loved it.
[Baptist Health South Florida]
