Welcome to the website of the KINE-ADL project. This project is funded by the Spanish Ministry of Economy, Industry and Competitiveness and the ERDF under the grant DPI2014-52095-P.
Kinematic characterisation of the hand oriented to the functional assessment of product handling in activities of daily living
January 2015 to December 2017
The increase of lifespan results in a higher number of older people and in an increase of the prevalence of diseases such as stroke, arthritis or carpal tunnel syndrome, which affect people’s manipulative ability. This functional loss affects the development of activities of daily living (ADL) needed to lead an independent life with normality. Current functional assessment protocols used in monitoring such diseases are highly subjective and often poorly correlated with the actual ability of developing ADL. These injuries or diseases affect the kinematics of the hand, this cause being partly responsible for the loss of capacity to develop these ADL. Therefore, a more complete experimental kinematic analysis may be useful to develop more objective and ADL oriented protocols. The control that muscles perform on the kinematic chains of the hand is complex and the exact role that each muscle plays in the development of ADL remains unclear. Therefore, a more precise characterisation of this role will help to make a better assessment of the possible surgical alternatives for people who have suffered an injury or disability in order to restore the maximum possible functionality. This characterisation can be performed by combining biomechanical simulation and experimental tests.
The present project starts from the prior experience in the field of biomechanics of the hand of the PIs and their recent collaboration with the ARMS lab Rehabilitation Institute of Chicago, to propose the following objectives:
- Kinematic characterisation of the healthy hand during the development of ADL by identifying synergies (postural patterns) and their further analysis (ranges and rates of change of the patterns).
- Identification of the role played by the muscles, both intrinsic and extrinsic, in these synergies during ADL, by recording the EMG activity of the different muscles that control the movement of the hand and the analysis of their correlations.
The outcomes expected are:
- Identification of kinematic synergies used during the development of ADL.
- Database of 'normal' synergies (postural patterns, rates and ranges) for healthy subjects, obtained with a representative sample of tasks and standard and adapted tools.
- Identification of the role played by muscles in the synergies of important ADL for personal independence.
- Identification of kinematic parameters that could be candidates (patterns, ranges and rates) to assess the functionality of injured or pathological subjects.
- Improvement of existing biomechanical models for simulating ADL.
The results of this project can be valuable in different fields related to health, personal independence and well-being such as the rehabilitation and improvement of surgical treatments of the hand and the design and development of dexterous prosthetics.