Biomechanical Model-Based Development of an Active Occupational Upper-Limb Exoskeleton to Support Healthcare Workers in the Surgery Waiting Room

Abstract

Occupational ergonomics in healthcare is an increasing challenge we have to handle in the near future. Physical assistive systems, so-called exoskeletons, are promising solutions to prevent work-related musculoskeletal disorders (WMSDs). Manual handling like pushing, pulling, holding and lifting during healthcare activities require practical and biomechanical effective assistive devices. In this article, a musculoskeletal-model-based development of an assistive exoskeleton is described for manual patient transfer in the surgery waiting room. For that purpose, kinematic data collected with an experimental set-up reproducing real patient transfer conditions are first used to define the kinetic boundary conditions for the model-based development approach. Model-based analysis reveals significant relief potential in the lower back and shoulder area of the musculoskeletal apparatus. This is corroborated by subjective feedback collected during measurements with real surgery assistants. A shoulder–arm exoskeleton design is then proposed, optimized and evaluated within the same simulation framework. The presented results illustrate the potential for the proposed design to reduce significantly joint compressions and muscle activities in the shoulder complex in the considered patient transfer scenarios.

Towards Reducing Risk of Injury in Nursing: Design and Analysis of a New Passive Exoskeleton for Torso Twist Assist

“…Whether exoskeletons can be safely implemented in healthcare scenarios involving patients is still questionable. Among the many available exoskeletons, only a few (Laevo and Atoun Model Y) have thus far been considered (Tröster et al, 2020). For example, Laevo exoskeleton is currently being used for patient handling during the second wave of the COVID-19 pandemic.…”

A Musculoskeletal Human Model-Based Approach for Evaluating Support Concepts of Exoskeletons for Selected Use Cases

“…Another contribution describes a individualized biomechanical simulation to optimize control parameters of a lower-limb exoskeleton based on a MHM (Khamar et al, 2019). To optimize design parameters of an upper-limb exoskeleton for healthcare activities, a MHM from AMS was utilized to analyse the physical stress of the activities and to evaluate the proposed design (Tröster et al, 2020). In summary, there are already different approaches to investigate the effect of support systems like exoskeletons.…”

Biomechanical Analysis of Stoop and Free-Style Squat Lifting and Lowering with a Generic Back-Support Exoskeleton Model

“…For that purpose, approaches based on biomechanically accurate multi-body simulations can be used to analyze and optimize the effects of exoskeletons on the biomechanics of the individual human body during different tasks and loadings [ 23 , 24 , 25 ]. For instance, Tröster et al recently proposed a musculoskeletal model-based exoskeleton design framework in which the motion data of manual tasks are considered to assess body loads utilizing refined multi-body simulations [ 26 ]. Analyses of the resulting body loads help design and assess exoskeletons that can relieve highly loaded body areas [ 26 ].…”