BKIN Technologies co-founders Ian Brown, seated, and Stephen Scott say the KINARM will help health officials better assess brain function. (Courtesy Queen's University)

A virtual-reality technology invented in Canada could improve how health workers assess people suffering from brain injuries and brain diseases.

The KINARM combines a chair with robotic arms and a virtual-reality system that allows researchers to guide patients through tasks, such as hitting balls with virtual paddles.

Once the tests are done, the system gives a detailed report on how the patient differed from normal.

The system has several advantages over traditional testing methods, such as touching one's finger or nose, said Prof. Stephen Scott of the Centre for Neuroscience Studies at Queen's University in Kingston, Ont.

"No. 1 is that it is objective," Scott said Monday from San Diego, where he is the presenting the research at the Society for Neuroscience Conference.

Currently, clinicians often assess patients with brain injuries and disease using crude, subjective scoring systems that range from zero to two, based on whether the patient can touch a nose or another object.

But those systems offer few choices, which makes to difficult to identify problems and show improvements after therapy, Scott said.

Scoring range

In contrast, KINARM offers a range of scores to distinguish people with a healthy performance from those who are impaired, just as blood tests have a range of normal and abnormal values.

So far, researchers have used the virtual-reality system to study normal brain functions, and now they are moving on to study arm movements when the brain isn't functioning properly.

Specifically, Scott and his colleagues in Calgary are looking at stroke patients and traumatic brain injury, as well as how healthy children reach and improve their motor skills.

Its hoped that knowing more about how brain injuries interfere with function will lead to more effective rehabilitation, as well as a better understanding of the impact of injury caused by accidents or other diseases such as multiple sclerosis, Parkinson's disease, cerebral palsy or fetal alcohol syndrome.

KINARM also has potential to help assess head injuries in professional sports and the military, the researchers said.

Queen's University is commercializing the technology along with BKIN Technologies.