Dr. Michelle Johnson demonstrates her rehab robot.
Dr. Michelle Johnson lost her grandmother to a stroke. Now she devotes her career to designing robotic systems to help other stroke survivors do what her grandmother couldn’t.
“I saw someone go from very vibrant and functioning to bedridden and not being able to use her limbs. It affected me,” Johnson says. “Then when I started getting into stroke rehab, there was a passion there.
I understood this was a real need. It’s not just about the science or the engineering; it’s about people.”
Johnson is an assistant professor and director of the Rehabilitation Robotics Research and Design Lab, a joint effort of Marquette and the Medical College of Wisconsin. With funding support from the American Heart Association and others, Johnson’s team is busy creating and testing innovative devices to help stroke survivors. She is also testing whether there are gender differences in robotic-assisted therapy.
One project is a simple video game system that uses joy sticks and steering wheels to help patients exercise an impaired arm. “The goal is to develop low-cost, affordable systems for home therapy,” Johnson says.
The researchers can adjust the wheel’s height, position and other perimeters to make the exercise more or less difficult. The machine employs both “rote” therapy — for example, using the wheel to chase a moving square across the computer screen — and more fun, commercial video games with a lot of action and flashy graphics.
“The rote therapy is more controlled. The fun therapy is more free form, but people are more willing to stay longer,” she says. “So there’s a trade-off there. The question is do both result in recovery, or does the engagement factor make a difference?”
The team also built the Activities of Daily Living Exercise Robot, called ADLER for short. By strapping the patient’s impaired arm into the device, ADLER helps patients move through three-dimensional space to practice movements such as reaching and drinking from a cup. As the patient recovers, the robot provides less help. One patient needed two-thirds less help after 24 sessions of therapy.
“The caveat is that not everybody sees the same amount of recovery,” she says. “It’s part of the research to understand who this benefits. Do you have to have a little bit of function and the robot helps you get more? We’re still trying to figure that out.”
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Quick Facts About Marquette
| Identity: | Catholic, Jesuit, private |
| Established: | 1881 |
| Location: | Milwaukee, Wisconsin |
| Undergraduate: | 8,048 |
| Postgraduate: | 3,500 |
| Campus: | Urban, 80 acres |
| Athletics: | 14 NCAA Division I teams (Big East Conference) |
| Colors: | Blue and Gold |
