JMIR Rehabilitation and Assistive Technologies

An increasing amount of digital health data are being collected across rehabilitation settings, but their integration into routine clinical practice remains limited, despite its potential to motivate patients or inform clinical decision-making. Specifically, effective visualization and communication of assessment outcomes to both patients and health care practitioners (HCPs) represent a key gap in the neurorehabilitation practice.

Children with hearing impairments (HIs) have traditionally faced difficulties with language acquisition due to various factors, such as difficulties in accessing early intervention and therapy, among others. There is an opportunity for digital technology to address this problem; however, how different technologies can facilitate language acquisition, as well as the level of evidence, is not well understood.

Although patient outcomes are improved by stroke rehabilitation, the suggested amount of therapy is rarely maintained. The COVID-19 pandemic aggravated this situation further due to disruptions in health care. One solution was the rapid and extensive transition to virtual care. A hybrid outpatient stroke telerehabilitation program (HOSTP) was introduced by St John’s Rehab—a tertiary rehabilitation hospital in Toronto, Ontario. The HOSTP integrated in-person and virtual care in an effort to alleviate long-standing obstacles that challenge stroke rehabilitation.

Demographic and epidemiological changes are increasing pressure on health and long-term care systems, underscoring the need for digital innovations. Remote Care Assist is a digital system that enables home care staff to connect with care experts for exchange and support via real-time video calls. Although technology acceptance is crucial for successful implementation, little is known about how care staff’s expected benefits for care recipients influence acceptance in professional home care.

Acquired brain injury (ABI) is a heterogeneous umbrella term encompassing traumatic and nontraumatic etiologies and is frequently associated with persistent cognitive dysfunction. Conventional neuropsychological assessment remains central to clinical evaluation, but feasibility and measurement precision may be limited in individuals with motor impairment, aphasia, reduced stamina, or fluctuating arousal. Eye tracking offers an objective, low-burden approach that can quantify gaze behavior during task engagement and may provide complementary process-level markers of cognition.

Geographical and economic barriers limit access to health care services in rural regions of Colombia. In San Vicente del Caguán, the lack of infrastructure and rehabilitation professionals forces patients to travel long distances. Asynchronous telerehabilitation using video broadcasting is a viable strategy to address these challenges.

Knee braces may improve symptoms and physical function following anterior cruciate ligament reconstruction (ACLR). However, their effectiveness depends on adherence, which typically relies on self-reported wear time, prone to recall and response bias. Objective measures (eg, temperature sensors), validated in footwear and orthotics research, offer a potentially more accurate alternative to self-reporting. Despite this, there is no research comparing self-reported and sensor-measured wear times in a knee brace.

Early mobilization and mobility are essential components of the recovery process following surgery and trauma-related hospitalization. In addition to personalized support from physiotherapists and health care professionals, assistive devices such as walkers play a crucial role in facilitating safe and effective mobility.

Peripheral facial palsy causes significant functional and psychosocial impairments, requiring precise assessment and patient engagement for effective rehabilitation. However, conventional clinician-graded scales (eg, House-Brackmann Scale, Sunnybrook Facial Grading System, and Stennert Index) are subjective and prone to interobserver variability, limiting their reliability for tracking recovery. Smartphone-based computer vision solutions offer objective, standardized facial movement grading, and interactive home-based training to improve adherence and outcomes.

Cervical sensorimotor control (SMC) is often disrupted in individuals with chronic neck pain, contributing to persistent symptoms and functional limitations. Traditional cervical SMC assessments are limited by complex setups, single-domain testing, and examiner dependency. Virtual reality (VR) technology offers a promising platform for multidimensional, standardized, and user-friendly assessment.

In this cross-sectional study of 300 board-style questions across physical therapy, occupational therapy, and speech-language pathology, we evaluated reasoning types and found high overall accuracy with variation by discipline and reasoning category; the strongest performance was in deductive and analytical reasoning and the lowest accuracy was in evaluative reasoning.

Lack of functionality is one factor that contributes to prosthetic rejection rates. Electromyographic upper limb prostheses are controlled through muscle contractions in the user’s residual limb. The incorporation of multigesture controls into a novel, in-house developed upper limb prosthesis requires users to differentiate between the strengths of muscle contractions to trigger programmed gestures. Little research exists on the limitations of expanding device capabilities. This expansion may lead to a decline in accuracy and perceived usability or an increase in training time and cognitive workload.