Designing a robotic knee device

Designing a robotic knee device to support and monitor the rehabilitation of patients

Supporting patients beyond the clinic

Knee osteoarthritis is one of the leading causes of chronic pain and disability in older people. For many patients, everyday movement can become difficult, and rehabilitation exercise plays an important role in reducing pain, improving knee function and increasing mobility.

However, rehabilitation needs to be personalised. To understand each patient’s progress, clinicians need to monitor important signals such as load and motion during exercise. At present, this information is not easily available. Instead, clinicians often rely on questionnaires and simple functional tests to evaluate the effect of rehabilitation exercises.

This can mean that patients do not always receive the best treatment for their individual needs, which may delay recovery and reduce health and well-being.

The project

Led by Dr Aiqin Liu, this project is developing a robotic knee device to support and monitor rehabilitation. The device is designed to provide scientific evidence that clinicians can use to evaluate patients’ rehabilitation progress.

Patients will wear the device during rehabilitation exercises and daily activities. Real-time feedback from the device will help patients monitor and manage their own rehabilitation progress.

Supporting personalised rehabilitation

The device will collect signals that physiotherapists can analyse to adjust exercise programmes remotely, according to each patient’s individual needs.

It will also provide real-time muscle support to help patients achieve rehabilitation goals or carry out daily activities such as walking, gardening or climbing stairs.

Why it matters

By combining rehabilitation monitoring, real-time feedback and muscle support, the project aims to help patients receive better rehabilitation treatment.

The intended impact is to relieve pain, improve overall physical knee function and prevent disability, while supporting a more personalised approach to rehabilitation.

Project highlights

Developing a robotic knee device to support and monitor rehabilitation.
Providing clinicians with scientific evidence to evaluate rehabilitation progress.
Supporting patients during rehabilitation exercises and daily activities.
Enabling real-time feedback for patients.
Allowing physiotherapists to adjust exercise programmes remotely.
Providing real-time muscle support for activities such as walking, gardening and climbing stairs.

Project team

Principal Investigator: Dr Aiqin Liu

Co-investigators: Professor Shane Xie

Postgraduate researchers and research support: Zhane Murrell-Smith, Fengtao Zhang, Meernah Alabdullah and Susanto.

Schools and research areas: School of Biomedical Sciences, School of Mechanical Engineering, and School of Electronic and Electrical Engineering.

Funding

This project is funded by UKRI, EPSRC, ESRC, Wellcome Trust and Grow MedTech.

More About The Project