An Initial Study of Virtual Button Pressing with Haptic Feedback for the Rehabilitation of Parkinson's Disease

The Virtual Button Clicking Simulation (VBCS), a multifaceted haptic reaching task simulation, was developed for rehabilitation of Parkinson's disease (PD). The VBCS was designed to provide personalized haptic feedback so that the users can practice reaching and touching 3D virtual buttons using a stylus haptic device (Geomagic Touch). The simulation system provides user preferred settings to change button design, size, arrangement with force feedback, and hand motion tracking. To evaluate the VBCS system, two user studies were conducted with ten healthy subjects and three PD patients. Each participant was trained to reach and touch a series of highlighted buttons using the haptic device and then provided a rating of the system usability using a NASA TLX sheet. The results suggest that the VBCS has a good usability in both healthy and PD participants and that the VBCS provides information regarding the timing and quality of the reaching movements. This data suggests that VBCS could be a helpful tool for upper extremity movement evaluation and motor rehabilitation in individuals with PD.