Quantitative assessment based on kinematic measures of functional impairments during upper extremity movements: A review

Background: Quantitative measures of human movement quality are important for discriminating healthy and pathological conditions and for expressing the outcomes and clinically important changes in subjects' functional state. However the most frequently used instruments for the upper extremity functional assessment are clinical scales, that previously have been standardized and validated, but have a high subjective component depending on the observer who scores the test. But they are not enough to assess motor strategies used during movements, and their use in combination with other more objective measures is necessary. The objective of the present review is to provide an overview on objective metrics found in literature with the aim of quantifying the upper extremity performance during functional tasks, regardless of the equipment or system used for registering kinematic data. Methods: A search in Medline, Google Scholar and IEEE Xplore databases was performed following a combination of a series of keywords. The full scientific papers that fulfilled the inclusion criteria were included in the review. Findings: A set of kinematic metrics was found in literature in relation to joint displacements, analysis of hand trajectories and velocity profiles. These metrics were classified into different categories according to the movement characteristic that was being measured. Interpretation: These kinematic metrics provide the starting point for a proposed objective metrics for the functional assessment of the upper extremity in people with movement disorders as a consequence of neurological injuries. Potential areas of future and further research are presented in the Discussion section. (C) 2014 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.