About this Research Topic
The ability to measure and separate recovery from compensation mechanisms for a given task performance is crucial for:
(a) evaluating the effectiveness of treatment and clinical decision making.
(b) longitudinally tracking changes in those components to assess capacity for recovery in a patient.
(c) evaluating and understanding the recovery mechanisms of various existing and novel therapies (e.g. tracking changes in arm use following constraint-induced movement therapy or reinforcement-induced movement therapy)
Unfortunately, commonly used clinical outcome measures based on the International Classification of Functioning, Disability, and Health (ICF) focus on task accomplishment with little emphasis on the quality and nature of the movements being assessed, and thus cannot dissociate between recovery and compensation.
The aim of this Research Topic is to bring together research focused on the quantification of both recovery and compensation components in the performance of different fundamental movements (e.g. reaching, reach-and-grasp, bimanual upper-limb movements, postural control, balance and stability, gait, etc.) and activities of daily living of interest in neurorehabilitation. The primary emphasis is on novel assessment and sensing protocols, and quantitative methods for measuring and dissociating between these components from objective sensor data, such as kinematics, forces, EMG activity, etc.
We welcome research articles targeting dissociation of recovery and compensation through quantitative means, including in the following subtopics:
● Novel mathematical or statistical approaches to quantifying recovery and compensation.
● Technology-based assessments (e.g. robot- or sensor-based) studies healthy and patient populations.
● Frameworks for quantitative assessment of recovery and compensation.
● New clinical assessment scales (human-rated, questionnaire, etc.), validation of existing clinical measures
● Systematic investigation of existing methods on unimpaired and patient data.
In addition, we welcome papers that can, indirectly, enable research in the area, such as:
● Open datasets of various movements and tasks from unimpaired and/or impaired subjects
Keywords: neurorehabilitation, sensorimotor assessment, sensor-based assessment, robotic assessments, clinical assessment scales, theoretical frameworks, movement quality measures, open datasets.
Important Note: All contributions to this Research Topic must be within the scope of the section and journal to which they are submitted, as defined in their mission statements. Frontiers reserves the right to guide an out-of-scope manuscript to a more suitable section or journal at any stage of peer review.