Recent Advances on Ankle Rehabilitation Device

Background: Ankle joint, as one of the important joints supporting the weight of human body, is vulnerable to injury in daily physical exercise and sports because of its special growth location and anatomical composition. The rehabilitation period of traumatic ankle is relatively long, especially in the later period of recovery. In order to relieve the clinical symptoms such as swelling and pain caused by ankle trauma, the rehabilitation of the ankle should be actively carried out by means of rehabilitation equipment. Thus, the ankle rehabilitation cycle can be minimized largely and the rehabilitation efficiency can be improved greatly. Objective: Through the summary of the latest literature on ankle rehabilitation devices, readers will be familiar with the research progress and difficulties in this field, and the reference for the followup study in this direction is provided. Methods: The structural characteristics and applications of the ankle rehabilitation devices are introduced in the paper. The latest patents and articles related to ankle rehabilitation device are compared and analyzed. Results: The ankle rehabilitation devices are classified according to the structure characteristics, driving mode and training function. The advantages and disadvantages of various devices are pointed out, and the future development direction of this research field is predicted. Conclusion: Studies show that remarkable improvements have been achieved on the ankle rehabilitation equipment. In the future, the structural optimization, new materials, control strategy, new type actuators, and rehabilitation evaluation of ankle rehabilitation devices should be further studied.