Quantification of Dexterity Through a Novel Electronic Device Available to Purchase

Cerebral palsy affects movement, muscle tone, and coordination as a result of an injury to, or lesion of, the immature brain. One of the most common manifestations of cerebral palsy is spastic hemiplegia, which limits arm and hand use on the involved side of the body [1]. Many treatment options are available but a major clinical problem is how to evaluate the success of these treatment plans. Currently, video analysis is the standard used for evaluating dexterity of cerebral palsy patients. This requires trained clinicians to spend hours watching video of patients performing specified tasks in order to evaluate baseline dexterity and improvements throughout treatment. VICON is the current state of the art device for motion capture. It captures motion using multiple video cameras around the room and outputs the position data of many points through time. VICON machines must be carefully calibrated and are too bulky to be used throughout a clinic. VICON can also not show the upper extremity dexterity necessary for tracking many cerebral palsy patients’ progress. As can be seen, no portable, efficient, and quantitative dexterity test for cerebral palsy patients currently exists.