Development of Hand-Assistance Device using Hand-Joint Orthosis and Neuromuscular Electrical Stimulation

The development of self-help devices has attracted attention in the light of improving the activities of daily living (ADL) in patients with finger paralysis. These devices are required to reduce discomfort and enable greater degrees of grasping motions in patients. In this study, we developed a lightweight self-help device that uses neuromuscular electrical stimulation and hand-joint orthosis to finely control the fingers. In addition, we examined the possible grasping actions by testing how well the users of this device exhibited improvements in their ADL. Our results indicate that our self-help device can potentially be adapted to address finger paralysis.