Research

Precision Rehabilitation is excited about partnering with Drs. Flynn, Rizzo, Lange and Winstein from the Institute for Creative Technology at the University of Southern California to explore the use of Virtual Reality Gaming Environments (VRGEs) to promote recovery of function after spinal cord injury (SCI), traumatic brain injury (TBI) and amputation. The focus of this research is to modify and develop innovative rehabilitation interventions that are based in the Virtual Reality (VR) gaming environment arena and that promote recovery of function after these catastrophic life changing events.

Precision Rehabilitation is proud to have been featured recently on NBC News Extra which highlighted this exciting research. Click here to view the NBC segment.

With VR gaming environments, a person enters a simulated world where they play games such as baseball, tennis, soccer and boxing. These games require that a person throw, catch, kick or punch a "virtual" opponent or object. This is a unique rehabilitative environment in that it allows greater freedom to experiment with movement while maintaining a relative absence of negative physical consequences, while at the same time being a quite engaging and motivating arena for motor practice.

What has not yet been explored is the therapeutic value of commonly available VR games not explicitly created for rehabilitation. While this technology lacks specificity, it has the advantage of mass accessibility, broad affordability and the potential for home use. The VR systems chosen for this current study at Precision Rehabilitation are the Sony PlayStation®, 2 Eye ToyT, Nintendo® WiiT, Novini®, Falcon® and the existing library of games developed via the USC NIH P20 grant for stroke rehabilitation. As the nature of the technology allows for unlimited repetition with ongoing feedback, training in the VE may lead to neural reorganization and a decrease in the deficits commonly found following neurological injury. As well, these VR game-based applications can be applied for motor rehabilitation of impairments following a wide range of acquired brain injury (i.e., skull-penetrating trauma, blast injury, stroke, SCI and balance training) in addition to upper and lower extremity prosthetic use training.

Please contact Sheryl Flynn P.T., Ph.D. at Precision Rehabilitation (562) 988-3570 for more information.