Effects of Adding Force Control to a VR Game on Brain Activation

Healthy Aging Clinical Trial

Official title:

Effects of Adding Force Control to a VR Game on Brain Activation

Clinical Trial Details — Status: Completed

Administrative data

• NCT number: NCT06412887
• Other study ID #: 112-181
• Status: Completed
• Phase: N/A
• Start date: July 10, 2023
• Est. completion date: August 11, 2023

Study information

• Verified date: May 2024
• Source: National Cheng-Kung University Hospital
• Contact: n/a
• Is FDA regulated: No
• Study type: Interventional

Clinical Trial Summary

One of the major contributor for the lower quality of living in the aged population, is the reduction in hand function. To mitigate this, several virtual-reality based hand rehabilitation/training systems have been developed.

However, most of these systems are solely controlled by hand gestures, and do not incorporate the force between the fingertips. Which is not the case for grabbing things in real life. With that in mind, the researchers assumed that a virtual-reality based hand rehabilitation/training system that incorporates force control into its input can be more beneficial in terms of recovering one's hand function.

To test out this claim, subjects were recruited and tasked to play a game using both input systems (wfc and wofc), while their brain activity while using both input system was simultaneously recorded using functional near infrared spectroscopy and compared

Recruitment information / eligibility

• Status: Completed
• Enrollment: 24
• Est. completion date: August 11, 2023
• Est. primary completion date: August 11, 2023
• Accepts healthy volunteers: Accepts Healthy Volunteers
• Gender: All
• Age group: 20 Years to 90 Years

Eligibility

Inclusion Criteria:

• With normal vision or wearing prescription glass that can fit inside the Meta Quest 2 VR headset.

• Able to understand English, Chinese, or Taiwanese language.

Exclusion Criteria:

• Experiencing motion sickness after prolonged usage of VR headsets

• Having chronic diseases or injuries that can prevent them from participating in the experiment such as: hand injuries, missing fingers, blindness, deafness, hearing impairments, etc.

Related Conditions & MeSH terms

• Healthy Aging

Intervention

Device:
• Virtual reality headset
Meta-Quest 2 virtual reality headset was used in this study

Locations

Country	Name	City	State
Taiwan	National Cheng Kung University	Tainan

Sponsors (1)

Lead Sponsor	Collaborator
National Cheng-Kung University Hospital

Country where clinical trial is conducted

Taiwan, 

References & Publications (14)

Bae SJ, Jang SH, Seo JP, Chang PH. The Optimal Speed for Cortical Activation of Passive Wrist Movements Performed by a Rehabilitation Robot: A Functional NIRS Study. Front Hum Neurosci. 2017 Apr 20;11:194. doi: 10.3389/fnhum.2017.00194. eCollection 2017. — View Citation

Friedman N, Chan V, Reinkensmeyer AN, Beroukhim A, Zambrano GJ, Bachman M, Reinkensmeyer DJ. Retraining and assessing hand movement after stroke using the MusicGlove: comparison with conventional hand therapy and isometric grip training. J Neuroeng Rehabil. 2014 Apr 30;11:76. doi: 10.1186/1743-0003-11-76. — View Citation

Howard, M. C. (2017). A meta-analysis and systematic literature review of virtual reality rehabilitation programs. Computers in Human Behavior, 70, 317-327. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.chb.2017.01.013

Hummel, J., Dodiya, J., Wolff, R., Gerndt, A., & Kuhlen, T. (2013). An evaluation of two simple methods for representing heaviness in immersive virtual environments. 2013 IEEE Symposium on 3D User Interfaces (3DUI), 87-94. https://doi.org/10.1109/3DUI.2013.6550202

Kivell TL. Evidence in hand: recent discoveries and the early evolution of human manual manipulation. Philos Trans R Soc Lond B Biol Sci. 2015 Nov 19;370(1682):20150105. doi: 10.1098/rstb.2015.0105. — View Citation

Kurillo G, Gregoric M, Goljar N, Bajd T. Grip force tracking system for assessment and rehabilitation of hand function. Technol Health Care. 2005;13(3):137-49. — View Citation

Magni NE, McNair PJ, Rice DA. Impairments in grip and pinch force accuracy and steadiness in people with osteoarthritis of the hand: A case-control comparison. Musculoskelet Sci Pract. 2021 Oct;55:102432. doi: 10.1016/j.msksp.2021.102432. Epub 2021 Jul 22. — View Citation

Pereira, M. F., Prahm, C., Kolbenschlag, J., Oliveira, E., & Rodrigues, N. F. (2020). A Virtual Reality Serious Game for Hand Rehabilitation Therapy. 2020 IEEE 8th International Conference on Serious Games and Applications for Health (SeGAH), 1-7. https://doi.org/10.1109/SeGAH49190.2020.9201789

Smaby N, Johanson ME, Baker B, Kenney DE, Murray WM, Hentz VR. Identification of key pinch forces required to complete functional tasks. J Rehabil Res Dev. 2004 Mar;41(2):215-24. doi: 10.1682/jrrd.2004.02.0215. — View Citation

Strote C, Golz C, Stroehlein JK, Haase FK, Koester D, Reinsberger C, Vieluf S. Effects of force level and task difficulty on force control performance in elderly people. Exp Brain Res. 2020 Oct;238(10):2179-2188. doi: 10.1007/s00221-020-05864-1. Epub 2020 Jul 13. — View Citation

Vanbellingen T, Filius SJ, Nyffeler T, van Wegen EEH. Usability of Videogame-Based Dexterity Training in the Early Rehabilitation Phase of Stroke Patients: A Pilot Study. Front Neurol. 2017 Dec 8;8:654. doi: 10.3389/fneur.2017.00654. eCollection 2017. — View Citation

Vergara M, Sancho-Bru JL, Gracia-Ibanez V, Perez-Gonzalez A. An introductory study of common grasps used by adults during performance of activities of daily living. J Hand Ther. 2014 Jul-Sep;27(3):225-33; quiz 234. doi: 10.1016/j.jht.2014.04.002. Epub 2014 Apr 21. — View Citation

Xia W, Dai R, Xu X, Huai B, Bai Z, Zhang J, Jin M, Niu W. Cortical mapping of active and passive upper limb training in stroke patients and healthy people: A functional near-infrared spectroscopy study. Brain Res. 2022 Aug 1;1788:147935. doi: 10.1016/j.brainres.2022.147935. Epub 2022 Apr 29. — View Citation

Zheng J, Ma Q, He W, Huang Y, Shi P, Li S, Yu H. Cognitive and motor cortex activation during robot-assisted multi-sensory interactive motor rehabilitation training: An fNIRS based pilot study. Front Hum Neurosci. 2023 Feb 9;17:1089276. doi: 10.3389/fnhum.2023.1089276. eCollection 2023. — View Citation

* Note: There are 14 references in all — Click here to view all references

Outcome

Type	Measure	Description	Time frame	Safety issue
Primary	Oxygenated hemoglobin (HbO)	The Oxygenated hemoglobin (HbO) was measured while the participants play the game under both conditions	1 hour
Primary	Game performance1 (Amount of grasp initiated)	This unitless metric counts the number of times the subject initiates a grasp while playing the game, a higher amount of grasp initiated signifies worst performance	1 hour
Primary	Game performance2 (Memory task accuracy)	This percentage is calculated by dividing the amount of correct response by the total amount of response. A larger perrcentage represents better performance	1 hour
Secondary	Manual dexterity	The manual dexterity of each participant was measured using the Purdue Pegboard Test at the beginning of the experiment	5 minutes
Secondary	Maximum voluntary pinch force	The maximum voluntary pinch force of each particapant were measured using the Jamar pinch dynamometer at the beginning of the experiment	5 minutes
Secondary	Recall	The ability to recall information of each particapant was measured using the forward digit span test at the beginning of the experiment	5 minutes