Hands are very important to Humans, we use them in everyday life, more than we actually realise. Unfortunately hand movement and grip can be impaired due to age, disability, or injury. This can pose problems as it can make everyday tasks more difficult or next to impossible to accomplish.

Recently, a new training programme to rehabilitate impaired hands has been discovered, with fantastic results. Thanks to a novel new training method, using a virtual reality programme, patients can now attempt activities like using a knife and fork, or pouring liquid out of a bottle without the dangers of spills or injury, this software allows the user to interact with a computer generated copy of a bottle, a knife and fork, or any other object. 

Meaning anything they ‘drop’ or ‘spill’ won’t actually create a mess, or cause themselves injury, they can simply reset, and try again. This software, however, can replicate the weight and force of an object, a computer generated water bottle will have the weight of a real life water bottle and tilting the bottle will cause the weight to adjust.  This is a revolutionary piece of technology as we can now create virtual objects and interact with them, as though they were sat in front of us in real life.

Dr Choi, one of the doctors conducting this training has said that using this simulation program increases the range of rehabilitation methods, to help more patients with impaired hands. In the future they will combine this rehabilitation method with traditional therapy to create a new customized rehabilitation programme. This technology is an exciting discovery, which, in time, could help many other people with different impairments!

Tenura specialises in materials catered to help those with grip impairments, from jar openers, to cutlery grips, we can provide an effective solution, and make simple tasks easier in every day life.