Rehabilitation robotics after stroke: a bibliometric literature review

ABSTRACT

Introduction

Stroke is the leading cause of long-term disability in developed countries. Due to population aging, the number of people requiring rehabilitation after stroke is going to rise in the coming decades. Robot-mediated neurorehabilitation has the potential to improve clinical outcomes of rehabilitation treatments. A statistical analysis of the literature aims to focus on the main trend of this topic.

Areas covered

A bibliometric survey on post-stroke robotic rehabilitation was performed through a database collection of scientific publications in the field of rehabilitation robotics. By covering the last 20 years, 17,429 sources were collected. Relevant patterns and statistics concerning the main research areas were analyzed. Leading journals and conferences which publish and disseminate knowledge in the field were identified. A detailed nomenclature study was carried out. The time trends of the research field were captured. Opinions and predictions of future trends that are expected to shape the near future of the field were discussed.

Expert opinion

Data analysis reveals the continuous expansion of the research field over the last two decades, which is expected to rise considerably in near future. More attention will be paid to the lower limbs rehabilitation and disease/design specific applications in early-stage patients.

KEYWORDS:

• Neurorehabilitation
• rehabilitation robotics
• stroke
• medical devices
• upper and lower limb
• bibliometric study

Article highlights

• Within robotic rehabilitation, stroke is one of the most studied diseases, justified by the high number of stroke patients whose therapies have repercussions on social and economic levels.

• Post-stroke rehabilitation robotics is becoming a mature sector in the field of research, collecting around 600/year publications.

• The scientific community prefer to publish post-stroke rehabilitation robotics in specialized journals rather than in conference proceedings. More and more attention is paid to open-access journals, which collect more citations than conventional (non open-access) journals.

• Many devices still lack a disease-specific application in the rehabilitation field, which shows a remarkable concentration in the technical-engineering rather than clinical-experimental field.

• Five different communities can be highlighted, which underline the fundamental role demonstrated by the design of the specific device for stroke rehabilitation.

• Research must continue the current trend of growth in the study of rehabilitation devices in the acute and subacute phases, which still have few design-specific devices.

• The intensification of research in post-stroke robotic rehabilitation for lower limbs shows a strong growth trend that will shortly lead to the same number of publications achieved by the upper limbs.

• Wearable devices are attracting increasing interest, where lightness, comfort and ease of transport are more suitable for the rehabilitation of patients directly at home.

Declaration of interest

The authors have no relevant affiliation or financial involvement with any organization or entity with a financial interest in or financial conflict with the subject matter or materials discussed in the manuscript. This includes employment, consultancies, honoraria, stock ownership or options, expert testimony, grants or patents received or pending, and royalties.

Reviewer disclosures

Peer reviewers on this manuscript have no relevant financial or other relationships to disclose.

Additional information

Funding

This paper was not funded.