Applying Human-Centered Design to Rehabilitation DeviceIntroductionMethodsField Observation and InterviewSubjectsInterview ContentsProceduresResultsDesign ProcessesDesign ObjectivesDesign FeaturesConclusion and SuggestionsReferencesC. Stephanidis (Ed.): Universal Access in HCI, Part I, HCII 2009, LNCS 5614, pp. 78–85, 2009. © Springer-Verlag Berlin Heidelberg 2009 Applying Human-Centered Design to Rehabilitation Device Lan-Ling Huang and Dengchuan Cai National Yunlin University of Science and Technology, Graduate School of Design, 123 University Road, Section 3, Douliu, Yunlin 64002, Taiwan, R.O.C. {g9630806,caidc}@yuntech.edu.tw Abstract. The current study investigated the patients’ problems and needs dur-ing therapy process. The investigation results were transferred to the product requirements of the rehabilitation device. The features of the new rehabilitation device included the following: 1) a webcam that can provide patients to com-municate with his/her families or doctors during the therapy process, 2) a visual display that provides patients the function to see their posture and is able to cor-rect their actions immediately, 3) physiological data such as movement angle, strength, and exercise time which were provided for diagnosis application for the doctors and their families, and 4) the main operational was designed to be adjustable for different individuals including its height, angle, and direction. The current design obtained positive evaluation preliminary by the occupational therapists. The procedure, methods and design of this study can be used as a reference for rehabilitation product design. Keywords: upper extremities, rehabilitation therapy, product design. 1 Introduction The aging population has become a world-wide phenomenon. Health care for the aging has been a popular issue. With aging, the physical condition degenerates and diseasing become more possible. According to the analytical report [4], cerebrovascu-lar disease has become one of the top three causes of death in America. In Taiwan, cerebrovascular diseases also occupied the third cause of death for the year of 2007 [2]. On the other hand, it is still a main cause contributing to stroke. Upper-extremity motor deficit is one of the main symptoms for stroke patients [3]. About 85% of stroke patients have upper-extremity function impairment at the begin-ning stage of stroke, and about 40% of patients still are with the function impairment at the final stage of stroke [6]. Some common upper-extremity symptoms of stroke patients are feeble muscle strength, unnatural synergies, and deficit in coordination within the joints etc [5]. In order to recover the function for daily life, rehabilitation therapy is needed for stroke patients. The six most frequently used products in hospitals in Taiwan for stroke patients are listed below. 1) Arm/ hand skate: the main movement direction is horizontal from left to right and reversed. 2) Climbing board and bar: the main movement direction is vertical from bottom to top and reversed. 3) Resistive pinch exerciser: the mainApplying Human-Centered Design to Rehabilitation Device 79 movement direction is vertical from bottom to top and reversed. 4) Vertical ring tree: the main movement direction is vertical from bottom to top and reversed. 5) Single curved shoulder arc: the main movement direction is horizontal from left to right and reversed. 6) Incline board: the main movement direction is vertical from bottom to top combining with horizontal from rear to the front and reversed [9]. The study results [9] showed that 1) the main movement directions of the above six pieces of equipment can be summarized as: horizontal from left to the right and re-versed, vertical from bottom to top and reversed, horizontal from rear to front and reversed, and small arc movements, 2) most of the equipment was old and outdated. In many cases, using an unaffected extremity to promote the affected extremity for restoring its lost movement ability has been conducted and proved in many studies [1] [7]. The theory for using an upper extremity on the unaffected side of the body to facilitate the other extremity on the affected side to recover its original movement ability for the stroke patients has been proposed and verified in various experiments and products. According to the above theory, using the unaffected muscles to facilitate the af-fected muscle in the same extremity to recover its lost movement ability was proposed Fig. 1. Illustration for using unaffected muscle to facilitate the affected muscle80 L.-L. Huang and D. Cai by the study. The idea is that supposing the affected muscle lost its movement ability along Y-axis direction and the unaffected muscle is still able to move along X-axis direction. Let the patients move their arms along a circular route, the unaffected mus-cle exercises a force F to move the arm from point A to point B witch made an angle of N between line AB and X-axis, then the affected muscle will be provided a com-ponent force Fy (F sin(N)) along Y-axis and the hand being forced to move to point B (Fig. 1). Therefore, the affected muscle will be trained by the component force Fy and will be facilitated in its movement ability along the Y-axis direction. When the circu-lar movement continued, the movement ability of the affective muscles will be drilled and progressed continuously. The rehabilitation therapy theory was then applied to design an integrated rehabilitation product for the upper extremities. 2 Methods The main methods in the study included a field observation and interview, a literature review for understanding state of the art of the rehabilitation products in Taiwan, a systematic design process, and applying a rehabilitation therapy theory and using a concept on human-centered design. The field observation and interview were used to survey the patients’ problems and needs during their therapy process. The results of the field observation and interview as well as the results of literature review were then transferred to the product require-ments of the rehabilitation devices. During the design processes, serial design activities such as brainstorming, ides sketch, and 3D model making were used and a rehabilitation therapy theory (using unaffected muscle to facilitate affected muscle for restoring its lost function) and a human-centered design concept were applied into product requirements to design an integrate rehabilitation