ReRobApp: A modular and open-source software framework for robotic rehabilitation and human-robot interaction

Abstract

Physical therapy combined with robotic, electrical, and/or multimedia systems is a promising approach for the development of innovative, engaging, and more effective reha-bilitation tasks. To foster the development of new rehabilitation strategies and protocols, we propose a fully-customizable and open-source software framework named ReRobApp for robotic rehabilitation and other human-robot interaction applications. ReRobApp allows, e.g., an easy integration of different robotic devices and sensors in the same rehabilitation task, and the development of control strategies based on an block programming intuitive architecture. To showcase the versatility of our proposed framework, we performed case studies using serious games, functional electrical stimulation, electromyography, and two different lower limb robotic devices for ankle rehabilitation in a single multiplayer task with different subjects.