Development of a Biofeedback Wearable Sensor System to Improve Rehabilitation Following Surgical Repair of Achilles Tendon Tears

Abstract

This paper describes the development, functionality, and initial testing of a wearable sensor system and companion smartphone app intended to support the rehabilitation of Achilles injury patients by providing 1) real time biofeedback, which can help patients adhere to rehabilitation restrictions; 2) exercise support to encourage patients to correctly perform all rehabilitation activities; 3) data summaries to clinicians in order to allow appropriate interventions when necessary. The wearable system is composed of insole pressure sensors, a calf muscle activation sensor, and inertial measurement units, whose data are communicated to the smartphone app via a Bluetooth enabled microcontroller. Initial testing demonstrated the quality of the data recorded by the sensors and the ability of those data to be used to identify functional activities like walking and stairclimbing.