Neurology, so humanoid robots can help cognitive rehabilitation

ORVersonic Roboticsan avant -garde Italian company in cognitive humanoid robotics and among the global leaders in the sector, has signed a strategic collaboration with the Villa Beretta Rehabilitation Research Innovation Institute (Vbrrii), center of excellence for the neurorying. At the center of the initiative is the integration of the famous Robeethe humanoid robot developed by Oversonic and already seen over the years in different robes and experiments (such as at the Santa Lucia Foundation in Rome where photos of the service were taken), in Rehabilitation medicine courses for patients with neurological pathologieswith the aim of strengthening the effectiveness of therapies and improving the quality of life of patients.

The project will be carried out in Lecco, within a joint research laboratory with the Polytechnic of Milan, creating among other things a highly specialized environment dedicated to innovation in the health sector. In addition to supporting patients in motor and cognitive recovery, Robee will contribute to the optimization of health personnel activities, reducing the workload and improving the operational efficiency of the structure. This initiative is part of a context of profound technological transformation of rehabilitation medicine, demonstrating how artificial intelligence and robotics can work in synergy to make the treatments more accessible and advanced. Vanityfair Italy He spoke about it with Franco Moltenispecialist in Rehabilitation Medicine and Scientific Director of the Villa Beretta Rehabilitation Research Innovation Institute of Costa Masnaga (LC).

What are the advantages of a rehabilitation involving humanoid robots?
The precise advantages are still to be discovered but we can imagine something. For example, we know that the collaborative relationship with a humanoid robot could facilitate concentration techniques, focus on the intention of movement, imitation of the movement through the observation of the gesture performed by the robot. All this is important to reconstruct the mechanisms of control of the movement in the patient and thus facilitate social activity. Compared to the interaction with a person in flesh and blood, the one with a humanoid robot could have an advantage: to be a stimulus to obtain greater concentration from the patient, who becomes more attentive and more motivated.

To what types of patients is this rehabilitation reserved?
Rehabilitation with humanoid robots is reserved for patients with acquired brain lesions, for example following a brain stroke or head injurybut also to patients who live a modification of cognitive skills, due to Parkinson’s disease, multiple sclerosis or initial phases of senile dementiafor example due to Alzheimer’s disease. Finally, it will be interesting to observe what will happen in the relationship between the humanoid robot and the people with cervical medullary lesionthat by not being able to move the upper limbs, they have great difficulties in environmental interaction: what will happen when they can exploit the activities of a humanoid robot to carry out daily life activities? This is also an important question to which we will answer.

Which robot do you use?
The robot is called Robee and is produced by Oversonic Robotics. It is a High -functionality of biomechanical high functionality robot and with a high control of the interaction mechanisms, which It will gradually equip cognitive abilities through software and algorithms with artificial intelligence, including generative. In this way, Robee will be able to exploit the information that will be captured by the sensors of which it will be equipped and those that will be expressed by the patient: its response will be modulated on the basis of all this information but also depending on how the machine will be instructed compared to the problems of the person with whom he interacts. The robot will therefore be subjected to a learning phasewhich will then be further fueled by the interaction with the patient.

What are the psychological mechanisms that are triggered by the relationship with a machine?
To begin with, when the person makes a request to the humanoid robot, he transfers his intention to do something. Thus creates a mirror mechanism for which the wishes of the
patient translate into an immediate response from an external interlocutor. If first the patient could only think certain situations, he can now relive them before his eyes. Let’s take an example: if I patient I am thirsty and I can’t take a glass of water, I can still speak with an artificial subject that responds to my request and brings me to drink. The person thus regains decision -making power, compared to situations in which, for example, when he was thirsty he played a bell and waited, perhaps even for a long time, before a nurse was available. In those situations, Patients risk losing the spirit of initiative Because so much their initiatives do not translate into concrete facts. Have a car, and above all a car that has its own physicality (unlike Alexa for example, which is only a mind), and which responds intelligently to your requests, stimulates the possibility of exploring and questioning things that first suffers only. Another example in this sense: the humanoid robot could also show how to perform an exercise and correct the person who repeats it, as an expert instructor would do.

In general, what are the prospects of the use of anthropomorphic robotics in clinical-rehabilitation contexts?
In a future scenario, anthropomorphic robotics has large possibilities of becoming a protagonist of health environments, supporting assistance activities. He can instruct the person in performing therapeutic exercises. It can be a tool to recover cognitive activities, such as attention and critical interaction. He can support nurses in assistance, from elementary needs to monitoring parameters such as body temperature or blood pressure.