Robots Train Occupational Therapists

Uploaded on 2024-10-15 in TECHNOLOGY-Key Areas-Artificial Intelligence, FREE TO VIEW, BUSINESS-Services-Health & Welfare

Robots are being used to help occupational therapists gain a better understanding of the impact of touch during physical and seated assessments.

The robots act as stand-ins for people being assessed, simulating various health conditions and characteristics.

They are part of a research project by Oxfordshire County Council's adult social care team, University College London (UCL), and the Oxford Robotics Institute (ORI), University of Oxford.

Part of an occupational therapist's assessment takes place through physical interactions to assess a patient’s mobility and posture. The hope is that the robots will help occupational therapists to improve their skills and assessments.

The research also looks at how touch can be used as a non-verbal communication method, known as 'affective touch', to comfort or support a patient.

UCL and ORI experts have built a robot and accompanying software with various sensors, capable of recreating a patient’s physical health profile and behaviour, to provide standardised training platforms for occupational therapists. The programme has been running for two years, from the initial objectives around further understanding the role of touch, to the most recent development of a mannequin-like robot.

This can be programmed to simulate various medical conditions such as arthritis and dementia.

The robot mannequin, called Mona, is now ready to be used by occupational therapists as a training platform. The ultimate goal of the programme is to understand the more nuanced uses of the sense of touch to create robots that can better collaborate with humans.

The project is funded by the Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council through the Embodied Intelligence: From Sensing to Collaboration programme grant.

This Is Oxfordshire | Oxford Mail | ORI | Instagram | RTHK

Image: TheDigitalArtist

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