Kinect Helps Phantom Leg Syndrome?

One of medical sciences’ great mysteries come from those that have lost a limb by some method (explosion, diabetes, animal attack), but yet still feel the arm or leg actually there. The phenomenon is called Phantom Limb Syndrome and affects many amputees long after their surgeries. This can include feeling as though the missing body part is shorter than it was in reality or that it is in a position that actually signals pain even though there is no arm or leg to issue that sensation. The problem is caused by the mind’s misinterpretation of what has transpired. The solution thus far has been to use a mirror box where the patient’s brain is shown the remaining limb in an attempt to convince it that it’s the other one. By doing so, the mind can manipulate it out of the painful situation it thinks its in. But it’s not a very intuitive process.

That is what Benjamin Blundell hopes to correct. But Mr. Blundell isn’t a scientist or health care professional. He’s merely a good natured hacker that wants to help his fellow man and he’s got the right idea if initial tests are any indication. While a mirror box is good, having the brain see a fully articulated character with all its limbs is better. So he’s created a virtual world inside the computer that gets its movement data directly from the Kinect and from a sensor placed on the amputated appendage’s stump. These two things can measure movement and recreate that inside the environment. The patient then uses VR goggles to be able to see himself as the character (in this case a lizard like creature that looks like something out of World of Warcraft) and train the brain to manipulate the phantom limb in a more natural way. By doing this, the person can release the clench that is causing the discomfort, perhaps even without being hooked to the machine as the mind develops the proper connections.


The research has not had any sort of medical review or anything, so it’s not like you are going to see such a system out on the market anytime soon. In fact, the device is really still in the infantile stages at this point, although the limited test results that Blundell has done, has been promising. In a patient that has Phantom Limb Syndrome that he’s been working with on the project, the man reported far less pain after using the system, which is a good sign. His paper and the project will be featured at the GRAPP conference on computer graphics, though we hope that it will find it’s way towards some sort of health journal to get the funding that his work definitely deserves.

In the meantime, we say good going indeed and look forward to the possibilities he’s opened up to help amputees everywhere who suffer from this horrific infliction.